[ Page 2281 ]

CONTENTS

Routine Proceedings

Trade and Convention Centre Act (Bill 23). Hon. Mrs. McCarthy.

Introduction and first reading –– 2281

Oral Questions.

Correspondence from government employees. Mr. Leggatt –– 2281

Storage of PCBs. Mr. Hall –– 2281

Salary of Minister of Tourism. Mr. Barber –– 2282

Confidentiality of Systems Corporation data. Hon. Mr. Curtis replies –– 2284

Matter of Urgent Public Importance

Salary of Minister of Tourism.

Mr. Barber –– 2285

Division on Deputy Speaker's ruling –– 2286

Routine Proceedings

Special Purpose Appropriation Act, 1980 (Bill 5). Second reading.

Mrs. Wallace –– 2287

Mr. Levi –– 2289

Hon. Mr. Fraser –– 2294

Mr. Passarell –– 2297

Mr. Hall –– 2299

Mrs. Dailly –– 2300

Mr. Cocke –– 2302

Mr. Lorimer –– 2304

Mr. Lea –– 2305

Mr. Lauk –– 2307

TUESDAY, MAY 6, 1980

The House met at 1 p.m.

[Mr. Davidson in the chair.]

Prayers.

HON. MR. WOLFE: Today we have a distinguished visitor in the gallery whom I would like to introduce. He is a Member of Parliament from Australia. His name is Mr. John Mason, leader of the opposition Liberal Party in New South Wales. I might explain that this is a provincial House comparable to our House here. Would the members please welcome Mr. Mason.

HON. MR. NIELSEN: Mr. Speaker and members of the House, I would like to acknowledge the presence in our galleries today of approximately 40 ladies from around the province who are the secretaries for the government constituency offices. These ladies have been engaged in studies to determine policies of government so they may better assist constituents by way of their constituency offices. We are most thankful for their assistance to the citizens of our province.

MR. BARNES: Mr. Speaker, with us this afternoon is a constituent of mine from the West End, Ms. Dorothy Cooke. I'm hoping that Ms. Cooke will be able to continue in that capacity — as resident — in spite of the high cost of rents in that area. I would like to have the House join me in welcoming her this afternoon.

HON. MR. CURTIS: Mr. Speaker, I deferred to the hon. member, and then he turned it into a political statement. Next time I won't defer, sir.

I have the pleasure of referring members of the House to a member of the last British Columbia Youth Parliament. Obviously, most of us have had some contact from time to time with that particular parliament, which meets in this assembly. The individual in the gallery today is James Fraser, a constituent of Saanich and the Islands. James is a student at the University of Victoria in Saanich and Oak Bay — not in Victoria — and he was a sessional minister with the Youth Parliament. Would the House make him welcome.

MR. COCKE: Mr. Speaker, visiting the House and in the gallery today is another constituent from New Westminster, the Royal City. I'd like the House to welcome Doug Hardy.

HON. MRS. McCARTHY: I am pleased on your behalf, Mr. Speaker, to ask the House to welcome Mr. and Mrs. Williams. Laurie and Ann are here from Delta and I would ask the members to join me in giving them a hearty welcome.

MR. LAUK: Mr. Speaker, on behalf of the first and second members for Vancouver South (Messrs. Rogers and Hyndman), I ask the House to welcome a constituent of Vancouver South, a distinguished member of the provincial executive of the New Democratic Party, Mr. Bob Staley.

MR. STRACHAN: I would ask the House to welcome guests of mine today. We have 30 school children from Quinson Elementary School in Prince George, along with their teacher, Cheryl Graves, and their chaperon, Nancy Graham.

MR. LOCKSTEAD: Mr. Speaker, this is a rare occasion for me. I have guests — constituents from Bella Coola, Mr. and Mrs. Barry Brower. I'd ask the House to join me in welcoming them.

MR. MUSSALLEM: Mr. Speaker, today we are honoured by the presence in the gallery of a member of the House of Delegates in the Parliament of Maryland, Ms. Anne Baker. I ask you to make her welcome.

Introduction of Bills

TRADE AND CONVENTION
CENTRE ACT

Hon. Mrs. McCarthy presented a message from His Honour the Administrator: a bill intituled Trade and Convention Centre Act.

Bill 23 introduced, read a first time and ordered to be placed on orders of the day for second reading at the next sitting of the House after today.

Oral Questions

CORRESPONDENCE FROM
GOVERNMENT EMPLOYEES

MR. LEGGATT: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Attorney-General. On June 9 of last year, Mr. Robert Kerr, an employee of the corrections branch, wrote a letter to his MLA, the hon. member for Chilliwack, Harvey Schroeder. That letter contained complaints concerning the operation of the Chilliwack forestry camp. It was forwarded to the Attorney-General and wound up on the desk of Mr. Kerr's supervisor, who was called in to explain why he was writing these kinds of letters. My question is this: can the Attorney-General advise the House whether it is the practice of his ministry, when dealing with correspondence from employees of the government or the civil service to their MLA, to refer that correspondence to the supervisor of the individual concerned?

HON. MR. WILLIAMS: Mr. Speaker, I learned of this incident just in the past few weeks and the question of that practice and others of a similar nature is under review by me now.

MR. LEGGATT: I am pleased that the Attorney-General has that practice under review. What I would like the Attorney-General to do now, if he would, is to assure the House that Mr. Kerr will not be disciplined in exercising his democratic right in raising complaints with regard to the correction service with his MLA.

HON. MR. WILLIAMS: Mr. Speaker, I am happy to give that assurance.

STORAGE OF PCBs

MR. HALL: My question is to the Minister of the Environment.

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I would like to speak with reference to B.C. Hydro's storage of PCBs in Surrey and ask him if he has made representation on behalf of the citizens of Surrey to ensure their safety and security.

HON. MR. ROGERS: Made representations to whom?

MR. HALL: To B.C. Hydro.

HON. MR. ROGERS: Perhaps for the edification of the member a little background into the problems of PCB might be of assistance. The current status with the PCBs throughout the western hemisphere is that they are stored in what are considered to be safe storage areas. There are at the present time no destruction facilities for these chemicals. The Americans were being quite lenient with British Columbia until the first of this month, at which time the American government closed the border between Canada and the United States where we had been trans-shipping our PCBs to safe storage in the state of Oregon.

I am advised by officials of Hydro that for the interim period, the storage of PCBs in Surrey is in a safe location. However, we are examining alternative methods of removing PCBs to other areas farther away from densely populated areas. At the present time we have only one place to ship them to and that is to Nisku, near Edmonton, Alberta.

MR. HALL: Has the minister inquired as to the length of time the PCBs are likely to be stored in this so-called temporary storage?

HON. MR. ROGERS: Ever since the chemicals were put on the restricted list there have been chemicals stored at this particular storage. They are generally assembled there until there is sufficient volume to justify a shipment from there to safer storage somewhere else. It comes in in dribs and drabs. I'll undertake to get a definite answer for the member.

MR. HALL: Mr. Speaker, in view of the condition in my riding that I've already questioned the minister about, regarding radioactive material dumped in Surrey, and now PCBs, is the minister working to establish some rules for safe storage or disposal of dangerous substances, in view of the reluctance of other jurisdictions to take these waste products? If he is working on such areas for safe disposal, is Surrey one of them?

HON. MR. ROGERS: The answer is no, Surrey is not one of them. The Canadian Council of Resource and Environment Ministers convention takes place in Halifax tomorrow, but for obvious reasons I'm not able to be in attendance. My deputy is there. This is the lead item of discussion for this conference. I've discussed the subject of finding a safe storage and disposal site within British Columbia, and the four western ministers of the environment have discussed the possibility of building one site in western Canada which would be sufficient to accommodate all our needs, because quite frankly the volume isn't sufficient to justify the horrendous expenditure necessary so that we each have duplicate plants. We are looking at it, and I would hope we'd have an answer relatively soon. The problem is that we don't know what the volumes of wastes are. Until we know what the volumes are it's difficult to judge what kind of plant we're going to build.

I would refer the member to the fact that radioactive wastes are a responsibility of the federal government under our agreement with them.

MR. HALL: In view of the minister's intervention that he reported to the House — that he had been in touch with the federal minister but nothing has happened regarding radioactive material in Surrey — is the minister now prepared to table any letters to the Atomic Energy Commission, the federal Minister of the Environment or B.C. Hydro which refer to any of the matters I've asked him about today?

HON. MR. ROGERS: No, Mr. Speaker.

SALARY OF
MINISTER OF TOURISM

MR. BARBER: I have a question to the Minister of Tourism. Could the minister inform the House whether or not she is currently — and has been since her appointment on January 11 — in receipt of a salary as Minister of Tourism?

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Hon. member, the minister may wish to answer, but the question is not that regular for question period.

MR. BARBER: My question is to the minister specifically. Has she, since her appointment as Minister of Tourism on January 11 of this year, been in receipt of a salary specifically designated for the Minister of Tourism? I believe that's in order, Mr. Speaker.

HON. MRS. JORDAN: I'd like to take that question as notice, Mr. Speaker.

MR. BARBER: I have a couple of other questions. Is the minister aware that she was appointed Minister of Tourism on January 11 of this year — a position that ordinarily qualifies the minister to receive a salary? Yes or no?

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Hon. member, before responding to that, I would call the member's attention to the fifth edition of Beauchesne, section 359(4), under "Question Period": "It ought to be on an important matter, and not be frivolous.

MR. BARBER: It is not frivolous.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The question is a frivolous question in the view of the Chair, hon. member, and there is no debate on a ruling of the Chair in question period.

MR. KING: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker, I think that this is a presumption, perhaps, on the part of the Chair, and I just want to assure the Chair that this is a very serious matter that the member is questioning the minister about, and thoroughly legitimate in terms of her responsibilities and duties as a minister.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Hon. member, there is no debate on a ruling of the Chair in question period. That has been a long-established practice of this House.

MR. MACDONALD: On the point of order, Mr. Speaker,

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the right of a member to sit in this House is not a frivolous matter.

MR. BARBER: To continue — because for the opposition it is a matter of grave concern — I don't know why the minister would take the question on notice.

Let me put another question, which I know you will find in order. Has the minister, since January 11 of this year, when she was appointed Minister of Tourism by order-in-council 51, been in receipt of any public funds for the purpose of travel, or such other out-of-pocket expenses as she may have had to pay in the performance of her duties as Minister of Tourism?

HON. MRS. JORDAN: Mr. Speaker, I believe I've taken the member's question as notice.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The question is taken as notice.

MR. BARBER: I appreciate that in the uproar the minister might not have heard the question, so let me rephrase it.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Hon. member, a question which has been taken as notice....

MR. BARBER: The first question, Mr. Speaker, with all respect, asked the minister whether or not she, since her appointment as minister by order-in-council 51, January 11, 1980, has been in receipt of public funds and specifically of a salary as the Minister of Tourism. She took it as notice. I am now asking whether or not, separate from the issue of salary, she has received any expense money for travel or other such out-of-pocket expenses.

HON. MR. MAIR: She took it as notice.

MR. BARBER: She took the salary question as notice, not the expense question.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order, please. Hon. members, address the Chair.

MR. BARBER: Certainly, Mr. Speaker. My question is: has the minister received, apart from the question of salary, any other funds from the Crown for her expenses as minister, be they for travel or any other out-of-pocket purposes? Yes or no?

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Hon. member, the question is virtually identical to the question that was just taken as notice.

On a new question, the first member for Victoria.

MR. BARBER: Mr. Speaker, my question is distinct from the first, which was specifically about salary.

Interjection.

MR. BARBER: Could you bring the Minister of Health (Hon. Mr. Mair) to order?

The second question is whether or not she has received expense moneys claimed from the Crown in the performance of her duties as Minister of Tourism. This is not salary moneys, but expense moneys. It is a new question.

AN HON. MEMBER: She took the question as notice.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The first member for Victoria.

MR. BARBER: Mr. Speaker, a new question for the Minister of Tourism: has the minister received, as Minister of Tourism, funds for any purpose whatsoever individually in the performance of her duties as Minister of Tourism from any source?

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The first member for Victoria.

MR. BARBER: Mr. Speaker, another question: specifically, has the minister received funds from the Crown to operate an automobile in her capacity as Minister of Tourism?

HON. MR. McCLELLAND: Mr. Speaker, on a point of order, it is my understanding that the practice in this House has been — for as long as I've been in it, at least — that when a question has been taken on notice, you can't supplement at that time. The supplementaries come when the answers come in. Mr. Speaker, there is a practice growing in this House of attempting to ask new questions which really aren't new questions; they are simply supplementary to the same question. I think that the House should take notice of that at this time and make some ruling on it.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Thank you. I would advise members that this is coming out of question period time.

MR. HOWARD: With respect to the point of order which was really a smoke-screen raised by the Minister of Energy, Mines and Petroleum Resources, one is entitled to ask why. Specifically, Mr. Speaker, you have identified them as separate questions because you have permitted them. It doesn't seem proper in accordance with the rules that you should have permitted the Minister of Energy, Mines and Petroleum Resources to raise a false and improper point of order.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Hon. member, the Chair will determine when points of order are not points of order.

MR. BARBER: I have a question for the Minister of Finance. Will the Minister of Finance inform the House whether or not the Minister of Tourism has been in receipt of a salary since her appointment as Minister of Tourism January 11, 1980, under order-in-council 51?

HON. MR. CURTIS: In response to the question, specifically, I will take it as notice, except...

Interjections.

HON. MR. CURTIS: One member of the opposition claims it's serious and the other members laugh. I'm not through with this question, Mr. Speaker.

...to say that the point to which I believe the first member from Victoria is alluding has not gone unnoticed by the government. Therefore I think that the question should be taken as notice and be answered at the appropriate time, as soon as possible.

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Mr. Speaker, with your permission, I would like to answer a question which was put to me in question period some time ago.

Leave granted.

CONFIDENTIALITY OF
SYSTEMS CORPORATION DATA

HON. MR. CURTIS: I would like to answer a question which was posed to me by the first member for Vancouver Centre (Mr. Lauk) some time ago concerning the confidentiality of information held by the British Columbia Systems Corporation. I thank the member, Mr. Speaker, for his patience while we explored the matter very thoroughly in order that the answer could be as complete and, obviously, as accurate as possible. As the member's question — as you will recall and as Hansard shows — related to two preceding questions that day, as I remember, which he directed respectively to the Minister of Transportation and Highways (Hon. Mr. Fraser) and to the Premier, I should perhaps take this fact into account; and I think that he should as well, because it was a series of questions.

In his preliminary question the member was, I believe, referring to two separate matters, both involving the same union....

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order, please. Hon. members, we are going through the reply to a question taken on notice in question period and it would only seem fair that our courtesy be afforded to the member who is giving that reply. That is not the case.

The Minister of Finance has the floor.

HON. MR. CURTIS: Mr. Speaker, as I said, the preliminary questioning that day was referring to, I believe, two separate matters, both involving the same union, which came before the Labour Relations Board. The member stated — and I paraphrase now — in these two hearings: "The B.C. Telephone Co. provided confidential information to the B.C. Ferry Corporation about the telephone accounts of members of the B.C. Ferry and Marine Workers' Union." However, what the member omitted — in error, I'm sure — from his questioning of my two colleagues was that in both of the two instances when this occurred, the information about the accounts was obtained, I am informed, under a summons from the British Columbia Labour Relations Board. As I'm sure all members of this House are aware, this province's Labour Relations Board is an independent quasi-judicial body which may summon or enforce the attendance of witnesses in relation to any matter relative to the resolution of issues faced by the board and, further, may compel them to give oral or written evidence on oath and to produce such documents as the board considers necessary to hear and determine any matter within its jurisdiction.

Mr. Speaker, I think you have a willing questioner and a willing answerer, but....

AN HON. MEMBER: Question period is over.

HON. MR. CURTIS: By leave, I believe, I'm answering a question. Mr. Speaker, I sense that the member opposite, who put the question to me and has waited for the answer, would like to hear it.

I was neither about to offer any legal points to that member, who is a member of the bar in British Columbia, nor to this House, but obviously it touches upon legal matters. I would then point out that in one of the proceedings before the Labour Relations Board to which the member for Vancouver Centre referred, counsel for the person affected initially objected to the admissibility of telephone records and then withdrew the objection. In the second of the proceedings, I am informed — and the member referred to this — no objection as taken by counsel acting for the person affected. I feel that I should also point out that it's my information that if an objection is made by any of the parties involved to a summons issued by the Labour Relations Board or to the production of any documents referred to in such a summons, then a closer look is taken and the summons is either maintained or quashed by members of the board.

I think that deals with the two particular instances which were referred to. As for the member's question concerning the British Columbia Systems Corporation and the confidentiality of information it holds, I would like to state clearly here that the matter of confidentiality of data held by the Systems Corporation is indeed of continuing and major concern to me, the other directors, and the management of the corporation. The role of the Systems Corporation in preserving the confidentiality of information it possesses on individual British Columbians is clearly a most important one. The Systems Corporation has a written policy on data security and confidentiality which was issued as a directive to all of the corporation's managers and staff in December 1977 and to all the corporation's clients — that is, other ministries of this government. This policy relating to the data security and confidentiality states that, firstly, "Data prepared by a government ministry is considered the property of that ministry"; secondly, "Permission for access to and distribution of data can come from the client ministry alone. The Systems Corporation does not extend" –I repeat, "does not extend" access to another ministry without authority"; thirdly, "The Systems Corporation accepts responsibility for the confidentiality of its data."

In other words, the Systems Corporation is essentially a custodian of the files and responsible for their security within the corporation. The information that is collected by a ministry and stored by the Systems Corporation is for use by that ministry alone.

For the information of the member opposite, and with the leave of the House, I would ask leave to table a copy of the British Columbia Systems Corporation policy as it appears in the corporation's management manual dealing with the question of confidentiality.

Leave granted.

HON. MR. CURTIS: Further, Mr. Speaker, just very briefly to conclude what I know has been a lengthy answer, on the first two matters which the hon. member raised to other members of the government on the day to which I referred — and I'm not speaking now of B.C. Systems Corporation confidentiality — my colleague the Attorney-General (Hon. Mr. Williams) has informed me that he has answered a question in writing. To put it more accurately, he has correspondence to the hon. member for Mackenzie (Mr. Lockstead) which deals only with the first two questions which were asked on the day referred to. I ask leave to table the document to which I refer.

[ Page 2285 ]

Leave granted.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The first member for Victoria seeks the floor.

SALARY OF
MINISTER OF TOURISM

MR. BARBER: Yes, Mr. Speaker. I do so under the provisions of standing order 35. I rise on a matter of urgent public importance, and this matter of such importance, if I may, will be briefly stated as follows:

On January 11 this year, signed by the Premier, countersigned by the Provincial Secretary (Hon. Mr. Wolfe), an order appointed Hon. Patricia Jane Jordan as Minister of Tourism. The Constitution Act, section 9(l), the edition as revised October 21, 1977, says: "The executive council shall be composed of such persons as the Lieutenant-Governor appoints, not exceeding 23, including the Premier of the province, who shall be president of the council, and not more than 19 of those persons shall receive a salary under this act." This particular statement of the Constitution Act is from RSBC 1960, as revised effective October 31, 1977.

Now the act was subsequently revised in the form of Bill 35 and it was given royal assent on July 31, 1979, and section 2 of that revision reads as follows: "Section 9" of the act itself, the section which I just read to the House, "1(a), 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6 is repealed and the following substituted: 'The Lieutenant-Governor in Council shall from among those persons,' etc...." The point I make by reading this, Mr. Speaker, is to indicate that under amending Bill 35, assented to July 31, 1979, section 1 itself was not amended. It was not repealed; it was not rescinded; it was and is still in force. Section 1(a) and all the rest were repealed, but not 1 itself.

To continue with the brief statement of the matter, Mr. Speaker, I have before me, as does every member, a copy of Revised Statutes of British Columbia 1979. This assembly will know that those statutes are not yet law. They are an enactment; they are not law. They have not been proclaimed as law. Reasonably enough, the government has delayed, in order to inform persons, barristers, judges and others of the contents of the new set of Revised Statutes 1979. We have no complaint with that. Nonetheless, Mr. Speaker, we find in RSBC 1979, which is not yet proclaimed as law, the following, in section 10 of the Constitution Act: ''The executive council shall be composed of persons the Lieutenant-Governor appoints, not exceeding 23, including the Premier of the province who shall be president of the council. "Section 10(2): "Not more than 19 of those persons appointed shall receive a salary under this act."

To restate briefly, Mr. Speaker, it's clear from RSBC 1960, from the amendments of 1977 and 1979 and indeed from the statute which is about to become law when it is proclaimed that the Constitution Act has specifically limited and prohibited to 19 the number of persons who may be in receipt of a salary as a designated minister with portfolio.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Thank you, hon. member. I think the member has very clearly made his point.

MR. BARBER: Now to continue briefly to state the point, Mr. Speaker....

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Hon. member, with all due respect, I find that the member has put his case forward quite well. If he would forward the motion....

MR. BARBER: I haven't finished the case. The case is, sir, that there are currently 20 ministers with portfolio, number 20 having been appointed on January 11, 1980. As the Speaker will remember, I asked today whether or not she was in receipt of a salary. It is a curious fact that she declined to answer. Therefore it is, we feel, the responsibility of the opposition to determine whether or not the Constitution Act has been observed in its entirety, to learn at the earliest....

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Hon. member, again I must call to the member's attention the fact that this is not the time for debate, and I believe the member has gone beyond the bounds of putting forward his case, which under standing order 35 very clearly is to put it forward briefly. And now, I believe, the member has a motion that he's going to forward to the Chair.

MR. BARBER: Yes, I do. Recognizing that there are apparently, contrary to the Constitution Act, 20 ministers with portfolio in the executive council including the Premier, concluding that apparently this minister would be paid a salary, as are all the rest....

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Hon. member, again I would caution the member for the final time that he is now engaged in debate. He has made his point and I am waiting for the motion.

MR. BARBER: I ask leave to move a motion for the adjournment of the House to discuss a definite matter of urgent public importance, to wit, the possibility that the Minister of Tourism has been in receipt of a salary contrary to the provisions of the Constitution Act as read before.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Hon. members, I am in receipt of the written statement from the member, and in view of the circumstances I shall reserve opinion on the matter, without prejudicing the member's urgency motion, as laid out in the standing orders. I will bring this back to the House at the earliest opportunity.

MR. HOWARD: The motion has been made, and nothing to the contrary can put it aside. I think that your reserved decision cannot be accepted, and I appeal your decision to reserve judgment.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Hon. member, in fairness to the matter that has been raised, it would be much more appropriate if the members were to allow time to come back with a more learned decision on the matter. I have not made a recommendation other than to come back at the earliest opportunity with.... Does the member not find this in accord with...?

MR. HOWARD: Every minute that this situation prevails is important, and I do appeal your decision to reserve your judgment.

HON. MR. SMITH: Mr. Speaker, is it in order for me to

[ Page 2286 ]

address myself to whether or not that motion is of urgent public importance?

MR. HOWARD: On a question of order, Mr. Speaker....

HON. MR. SMITH: Well, I will take my ruling from the Speaker and not from the member who is on his feet when I'm on my feet.

Interjections.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order, please. I wonder if the hon. members would allow the Chair just a moment of consultation on this matter.

Hon. members, it is and has been a long-established practice of this House that the Chair has the right to reserve a decision, particularly on a matter of this importance. I would ask all hon. members to afford the Chair that opportunity to do so in this case.

MR. HOWARD: There may well be — and we don't know that — a transgression of the constitution, and every minute that passes by makes it more difficult. What ruling are you making with respect to the appeal that I launched against your decision to reserve judgment?

HON. MR. WILLIAMS: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker, you have stated what is the long-standing practice in such matters before this House, and this right of the Speaker to reserve on a matter of urgent public importance is not subject to appeal.

MR. BARRETT: Mr. Chairman, you are making a ruling. Is that correct?

DEPUTY SPEAKER: I am citing the long-established practice of the House, hon. members.

MR. BARRETT: That is correct — and making a ruling on that long-established practice. Is that correct? To instruct the House you have to make a ruling.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The right to reserve has always been a long-established practice of this House.

MR. BARRETT: That is your ruling?

DEPUTY SPEAKER: That is my ruling on....

MR. BARRETT: We challenge your ruling, Mr. Speaker.

MS. SANFORD: Is that debatable?

MR. BARRETT: There is no debate on a challenge of ruling.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The member for Dewdney (Mr. Mussallem) rises on a point of order.

MR. BARRETT: Mr. Chairman, on a point of order, I've challenged your ruling.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order, please, hon. member.

MR. BARRETT: There's nothing to say. I've challenged your ruling. Mr. Speaker, you have made a ruling and I've challenged your ruling and there is no further debate.

Interjections.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order, please. Hon. members will please take their seats.

Deputy Speaker's ruling sustained on the following division:

YEAS — 26

NAYS — 26

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The Chair's ruling is sustained.

MR. HOWARD: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker, inasmuch as the Minister of Tourism (Hon. Mrs. Jordan) cast a vote on this particular question....

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. HOWARD: Just be patient.

Interjections.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order, please. Hon. members, the member for Skeena is on his feet on a point of order and has been recognized by the Chair. Please continue.

MR. HOWARD: Let me start from the beginning, Mr. Speaker, so it's all in one easy sentence. Inasmuch as the Minister of Tourism stood and voted on the particular question which has just been decided, and because she had earlier taken certain questions on notice about whether or not she had received any salary, allowances or any other thing, obviously what the minister has done by casting that ballot is to opt for the position that she has received no salary and she is clear of any question.

[ Page 2287 ]

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Hon. member, by no stretch of the imagination can I find that a valid point of order.

The Minister of Health on a point of order.

HON. MR. MAIR: Mr. Speaker, is it now the rule of the House that the member for Skeena can get up on any drivel and tripe that he wishes, attain the attention of this House and take up our time, or does he have to name the standing order under which he rises? Every day we witness time after time this drivel from this member, over and over again rising on frivolous points of order and taking up the time of this House.

Interjections.

[Deputy Speaker rose.]

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order, please. Neither the point raised by the last speaker nor the point raised by the first speaker were valid points of order.

Interjections.

[Deputy Speaker resumed his seat.]

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The Leader of the Opposition on a point of order.

MR. BARRETT: Mr. Speaker, could you inform the House under what standing order your vote was the tie breaker in terms of a challenge to the Chair?

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Under standing order 10, hon. member.

Orders of the Day

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The member for Nelson-Creston has the floor on a point of order.

MR. NICOLSON: Mr. Speaker, my point of order is that there is a priority motion which gives priority to the disposal of departmental estimates until they are disposed of. The way to proceed to bills would be to ask leave and then for the Chair to put the question asking that leave be granted. I rise because I don't want to see us falling into some sort of slipshod new practice which would make that government more of a laughing-stock than it already is.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The member for Nelson-Creston has raised a valid point of order.

HON. MR. GARDOM: Mr. Speaker, I guess that in all of the noise going on in the House and our good humour the member for Nelson-Creston didn't hear what I said: "...to proceed by leave to public bills and orders."

DEPUTY SPEAKER: In that case, hon. member, it was the Chair's omission that leave was not called. Shall leave be granted?

Leave granted.

HON. MR. GARDOM: Adjourned debate on second reading of Bill 5.

SPECIAL PURPOSE
APPROPRIATION ACT, 1980

(continued)

MRS. WALLACE: It's a long time, Mr. Speaker, since we discussed Bill 5. When I adjourned the debate some days ago, I had dealt with some of the moneys covered in this particular bill. I had indicated that I was a bit concerned about the priorities that were being placed on the moneys allocated in this bill, and I had also indicated that I was a bit surprised that it was a bill at all. In fact, I think I had referred to it as the third supplement to the estimates. It is that particular facet of this bill with which I wish to deal today.

We have a bill here that totals some $168 million, which is a very small amount in relation to the total budget. Certainly the specified amounts allocated to the various given ministries under this bill are minimal compared to their total estimates, which we hope to be discussing at some point in time. The opposition and certainly I feel that it is a very unnecessary thing to allocate the small amounts of money in the form of a bill, because it would indicate that the government was not aware of how much they were going to spend or how they were going to spend it when the estimates were prepared, and dribble by dribble, as the money came it, they kept popping bills onto the order paper to utilize this money that they had collected from the taxpayers of the province.

I was interested to look at the totals, Mr. Speaker, in relation to the way the moneys were used last year. Certainly last year there seemed to be no necessity to have a bill to provide for a great deal more money than is provided in this particular bill. In fact, last year, according to the statement of special warrants issued in the comptroller-general's report, in excess of $282 million was expended without an estimate, without any authority at all except an order-in-council. It seems very strange that we suddenly have to have a bill to allocate nearly half of that amount, that this year we're faced with dealing with a bill for these piffling little amounts.

It's interesting to relate those various amounts in relation to the various ministries....

HON. MR. CURTIS: What did you call the amounts?

MRS. WALLACE: Piffling little amounts.

Under the Labour estimates, for example, some $4.5 million are allocated. There is a total estimate for Labour of $56.9 million, and here we have this very small amount covered in a special bill. Last year there was no compunction about issuing a special warrant, not for that much, but certainly for nearly $1 million for Labour overexpenditures.

In the Ministry of Lands, Parks and Housing, we have two different amounts: one for $1 million, and one for $6.5 million — a total of $7.5 million out of a total budget of $63.3 million; again, a very small amount of the total budget that is allocated under this special bill.

This year we have a $1 million special appropriation under your bill. Last year $2.3 million was accounted for in special warrants for that particular ministry. Again, it seems a very strange of procedure, Mr. Speaker. In education, with a budget of over $1 billion, we have $1.2 million allocated under this bill. Now why in the world couldn't that simply have been included in the minister's estimates? Certainly last year when it wasn't in his estimates he was prepared to spend 1.8 million under special warrants. This year we have a bill for $1.2 million.

[ Page 2288 ]

We go on to Mines, Mr. Speaker. Allocated to Mines under this particular bill is a sum of $1.8 million, yet in the estimates we have a total budget of $21.1 million and — horror of horrors — last year that particular ministry had an overrun for which special warrants of $17.3 million were issued. Yet here we have a bill to give them $1.8 million. It is a very strange method of financing a government and government operations.

The Provincial Secretary has $5 million on a budget of $195.7 million. Last year there was an overrun of nearly $1 million. Mind you, that is just a fifth of that amount, but it was done with an overrun and a special warrant last year. You have a budget of $195.7 million — it could have been up to $200 million — and no need for this bill. It is a very unnecessary bill.

Last year the special warrants for science and technology were included in Education. This year with an estimate for science and technology of $292.5 million, we have $6.5 million as a separate item in this bill.

The purpose of this bill escapes me. As I said, it is nothing more than a supplement to the estimates. It has no place on the order paper. It either shows a need to try to build a little image by bringing in a bill and talking about surplus revenue or else it shows some very poor bookkeeping and accounting practices. Perhaps it shows both.

We go on to Industry and Small Business Development, where that minister is getting $10 million under this particular bill. His estimates for this year are $59.1 million. Last year he had almost half that $10 million covered by special warrants; an equivalent amount — $4.3 million by special warrants. Here we have two allocations of $5 million each going to that ministry and it could just as well have been included in the estimates. There is no need for the bill.

Of course, when we get to the Ministry of Transportation and Highways we have a very apt example of how what was good for last year is not good for this year. Last year that particular Minister of Transportation and Highways (Hon. Mr. Fraser) had overexpenditures and overruns covered by special warrants in the amount of $119.6 million. Yet this year we have a special bill to give that Minister of Highways $103.4 million in total from two different projects. His expenditures for the year are estimated to be $513.8 million.

So the point I am making is simply to clarify and emphasize the position that I had stated earlier, that this bill is an unnecessary bill; it is a political bill to try to gain a few points with the electorate, to try to build some prestige on the idea that they are granting these moneys, that they are able to do all these sorts of special things for the electorate, when really it is no more or less than just a part of the estimates. That is where that money should have been; that is where it should more properly be accounted for to do a proper job on estimating so you don't have to have a special little bill for special little amounts of money in the hope of making some political mileage out of it.

What assurance do we have that this time around, in spite of the estimates that are discussed in this House and in spite of this bill which is going to give them some extra moneys, that we're not also going to be faced next year with the same kind of special warrants that we had last year? I have no confidence in the ability of this government to get the estimates right, to do a job in estimating what they are going to spend and how they are going to spend it, or in estimating what their income is going to be. They certainly have not proven over the last few years that they have that capability, and I don't expect this year to be any exception.

So I expect that not only are we going to have the estimates, we are going to have Bill 7, which could be part of the same thing; we're going to have Bill 5, which most certainly should have been part of the estimates; and I would expect by the end of next year we're also going to have a whole lot of special warrants to show that even after three attempts they're not able to get it right. For that reason I just have no reservations at all about opposing this bill, because it's a bill that should never have been here in the first place. It's simply something that should have been included in the estimates. We shouldn't be wasting the time of the House discussing these kinds of fiddling little amounts of money for fiddling little projects, to try and create a bit of political prestige. And for those reasons, Mr. Speaker, I certainly oppose the bill.

I am concerned that we are taking up time debating this particular item in isolation from the rest of the expenditures of the government. We should far more properly be dealing with the total estimates for each ministry, so we can get a true and full picture of what those ministers are proposing in each of their areas of responsibility, instead of dealing with it piecemeal like this. We have these little bits in this bill, other bits of money — more sizeable, I agree — that could just as well be included in the total estimates. I'm sure that there are many projects in the estimates that are just as high-cost as the specific items in either this bill or Bill 7 — and I know I can't relate to other legislation, Mr. Speaker; I'm just doing it in passing — but certainly there is no need for this kind of bill to be on the floor of this Legislature, unless, as I say, it's done to try and build up a little bit of political prestige by trying to highlight a few things.

I would suggest that one of the most likely reasons is that the government has just not been able to master the ability of estimating. Whether it's deliberately done or not I'm not sure; it could be deliberately done. I have certainly indicated that I have had those concerns when we've discussed estimates before, Mr. Speaker. It could well be that this government deliberately underestimates the revenue and overestimates expenditure in order to build up surpluses, so we can have these kinds of little bills. Or it could be that they are just not able to come up with a ball-park figure of what the revenue is going to be and what the expenditures are going to be. Or it could be that having once arrived at what they're going to expend their money for and how it's going to be expended, they have not been able to live within those limitations which they have set upon themselves. For whatever reason, we're faced with some very strange numerical gimmicks in this House, in having so many different forms of putting expenditure before the House.

This concerns me, because I really feel that when we're dealing with a given minister in his or her given estimates, we should be able to deal with all the facets of his or her responsibility instead of talking to the Minister of Finance about things that are by no manner of means the responsibility of that minister; they're definitely the responsibility of the many other ministers that are named in this particular bill — some seven or eight of them — and have nothing to do with the Minister of Finance at all. They're the responsibility of those other ministers; they should be being discussed in the estimates of those other ministers, not in this bill. I would just hope that this year would see an end to this kind of bill on the floor of the Legislature, where we do not have that opportunity

[ Page 2289 ]

of discussing those various items that a minister is responsible for under his or her particular estimates. They should be included in the estimates. No more of these bills, Mr. Speaker. For that reason I'm opposing the bill.

MR. LEVI: Mr. Speaker, it's nice to see you sitting there. It was pretty close there before. I was wondering whether we were going to carry on.

Interjection.

MR. LEVI: Well, you must not say anything. We don't even know whether you should be here, Patsy. You'd better keep quiet. You know, it's not going to make your case any better if you keep talking.

AN HON. MEMBER: You big bully.

MR. LEVI: Mr. Speaker, you don't really think that that minister could be intimidated, do you?

The Minister of Finance has had an opportunity three times in this particular session of the House to have a budget speech. He presented his budget speech; he presented another bill which made reference to another kind of budget, which was a surplus; and now we're into the third budget speech under this bill, which again talks about surpluses. The government has not had a particularly good record in terms of understanding what it has to do with the money that it gets. Every year since they've been in government since 1976 they've either had to re-write budget speeches or issue enormous overruns in terms of expenditures. In this last fiscal year alone the overrun was almost $400 million. Here we are again with another bill.

Oh, the minister's now coming into the House; we can feel much freer about debating it.

HON. MR. CURTIS: I was listening.

MR. LEVI: You were listening? That's good, Hugh. I'm glad you were doing that.

I think the minister should, when he's closing the debate on the bill, give us some idea what the government is doing in terms of looking at its whole estimate process. What does it mean when he talks about the future of capital investment in this province? Upon what is he basing his remarks?

For instance, Mr. Speaker, in respect to the finances of this province, for two years we've been trying to get from that government a series of reports that have been paid for by the taxpayer. I have in mind the Schroeder report, which deals with capital markets. That report was announced. It was given to the Schroeder bank people — people with an international name in respect to giving this information on capital markets. What kind of investment process do we have in British Columbia? It cost the taxpayers $125,000. Presumably it did an analysis of the kind of capital investment projections that we can have, which must be of value to the minister. After all, he has to be able to look at future revenues. The theme, generally, in the way the minister and his predecessor have been handling his portfolio has been to underestimate, to get a large amount of revenues, and then to have to come into the House with a series of bills.

Now we know that they don't have that much trouble with the estimate process. After all, the estimate process starts in July. Nobody can tell me that by October or November, which was the usual time when the estimate process was finished, the minister would not have a good idea as to exactly how much money he was going to put into his budget for the following fiscal year. He could avoid this kind of nonsensical game that we have of having not one but two supplementary estimates. Two supplementary estimates!

AN HON. MEMBER: Nonsense!

MR. LEVI: Yes, it is nonsense, Mr. Member. I know that the minister is upset because we call it nonsense, but you've had three chances at making budget speeches and you're getting boring. We can't keep listening to you coming into this House and making budget speeches.

I would like the minister to tell us if he has had a look at the Schroeder report. Has it been of any value to him? After all, the Schroeder report was going to examine the whole capital market structure. It was a worthwhile effort. I'd like to see it; I think everybody in this House would like to see it; I'm sure that the people in the investment field would like to see it, even if it's only the stock exchange people. That report comprised a study of the stock market.

So there's value in that kind of investment. Unfortunately, I'm told in a letter I've received from the Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs (Hon. Mr. Nielsen) that the report is now out of date. They've spent $125,000 trying to understand the capital market. It could have been made available to that minister. He would have had a better understanding of what the capital structure was, the investment structure was, and what kind of projections he could have made. But it's not been made available. I don't even think he's seen it.

It's very important, Mr. Speaker. I know you're looking rather skeptical, trying to see whether this deals with the principle of the bill. Of course it does. We're dealing here with the Special Purpose Appropriation Act, which deals with the whole business of surpluses. This is the second surplus bill that we've had, and I'm asking the minister to take a look at this report so that he can have some understanding and won't make the same mistake next time.

There's also another report that would be of value to him. It was a report that was commissioned by the Minister of Industry and Small Business Development (Hon. Mr. Phillips) in conjunction with his colleague, the Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs. It dealt with with whole question of debt and the equity situation in the province.

Interjection.

MR. LEVI: Yes, Mr. Minister of Municipal Affairs (Hon. Mr. Vander Zalm), there is such a report by Brown, Farris and Jefferson. It cost $60,000, and is another useful report that the government could make use of and not make these kinds of mistakes. We haven't seen that report either. We hear from the minister all the time about the kind of economic planning that's going on over there, the kind of wooing that they have to do to get the right amount of investment capital into the province. After all, that's what helps to provide the revenue, albeit it's not that large in terms of the corporate sector that pays just under $400 million in taxes versus the average worker in that employee category that pays pretty close to $2.5 billion. There's a great difference between the contribution from the private sector in terms of the revenue of this province and what the workers

[ Page 2290 ]

pay. Nevertheless, the reports are necessary to have that kind of understanding.

In the bill, one of the items.... Item (f) is something worthwhile to consider. This deals with the additional $5 million to the Minister of Industry and Small Business Development. Mr. Speaker, we have been debating in this House for pretty close to five weeks a very serious problem that exists in the Fraser Valley in respect to Maplewood Poultry. There is $5 million there. That $5 million presumably would provide money to assist operations like Maplewood — but not the kind of offer that was made by the minister; we're not talking about that. If the minister will get up and assure us that out of that $5 million he is going to pick up and take care of all the problems of Maplewood Poultry, I am sure that every member on this side will say, right, let's push the bill through, let's get the Lieutenant-Governor in, we'll pass it and give them the money.

But, Mr. Speaker, we only know that the government is prepared, at the moment, to pick up half of their losses. Now we know that within the Ministry of Industry and Small Business Development there are a number of programs. The minister said the other day that there are lots of programs to do this kind of development work. So we begin to wonder why he needs another $5 million. I would hope that a significant amount of that $5 million is going towards the saving of the poultry and turkey industry in this province. That is how that money could be applied, because that is a worthwhile effort. But we haven't heard that, mainly because we deal basically in these kinds of bills with a lot of window-dressing.

Not even under the previous Social Credit government can I recall that they ever brought in a Special Purpose Appropriation Act. Even the name is a mouthful. It doesn't really have any relevance to what you're supposed to be doing. Special Purpose Appropriation Act — it sounds like it came out of the U.S. Senate. "Special Purpose Appropriation Act, 1980. The purpose of this Bill is to authorize the payment of an amount not exceeding $168.65 million out of the 1979-80 surplus for the purposes specified in the bill."

I'll bet you, Mr. Speaker, that in the next fiscal year we are going to have at least three of these bills, because I'm sure the Minister of Finance is not going to be able to come into this House with a surplus of something like a billion dollars that is going to be sitting in his surplus fund. A billion is anticipated because of the way they've done their budgeting. They've announced a number of programs, and then we find at the end of all the programs very little spending at the end of the fiscal year. The Minister of Forests (Hon. Mr. Waterland) has 120-odd million dollars, and the most they are going to spend, even according to the minister's documents, is $19 million. So next year there will be another Special Purposes Appropriation Act to take care of the surpluses in the fiscal year 1980-81. But it is going to be tougher because the amounts are going to be much larger. Then we're going to have to go through it a second time and a third time.

Obviously we have to question the kind of economic planning that they do. I hope the Minister of Finance is prepared to tell us, in respect to the two specific questions I've asked him, whether he's had an opportunity to look at the Schroeder report and the Brown, Farris and Jefferson report, both of which should be of great assistance to him in the job that he does. We haven't seen any of these reports. We would like to see them, because we want to have some understanding of the actual picture vis-à-vis the capital market situation in British Columbia, particularly because it does affect the function of the Minister of Finance in calculating his revenue.

We have had for four and a half years now a great debate in respect to the first item in this bill, which is the one to reduce the unmatured debt of $235,347,790. Nobody out there believes them anymore, but they keep repeating the myth all the time. If that's what they want to do, that's fine, they can do that.

One of the interesting amounts is the amount not exceeding $100 million to the Minister of Transportation and Highways (Hon. Mr. Fraser). Every time I look at the Minister of Transportation and Highways and every time I have to deal with him in one way or another on this floor there is always some mention of $100 million. He and I have something in common. My gosh, in three years he's had $250 million worth of overruns. I don't know how you can sit in front of the Minister of Municipal Affairs and not blush around your ears. He is sitting there totally embarrassed, Mr. Speaker, having to sit behind the Minister of Transportation and Highways, who is an absolute wastrel in this government. After all, he has $100 million overruns.

You know, I can remember that minister when he was over here and was Chairman of Public Accounts. He was the first opposition member in this province to be Chairman of Public Accounts, because that is what the previous government did. In 1974 he went to the press and said: "That Minister of Human Resources and his $100 million overrun! We're going to have him in front of Public Accounts, and we want an accounting." Well, I waited with bated breath for 18 months, and I did not get my appearance before Public Accounts.

Here we are talking about giving that minister something not exceeding $100 million. You know, his is one of the better planning departments in the government. After all, what does he have to do? He has to measure all the roads in British Columbia and then calculate how much blacktop there is and how much he's going to put down this year. That's not too difficult. The only variable in that is probably the cost of the blacktop. But here he is having to have another $100 million. He's a $100 million man. He's a much better looking $100 million man than the other one. That's the guy. There are only two ministers in this province who ever had $100 million overruns and there's one of them sitting over there. And my gosh, have we got expectations to get a $150 million overrun out of that guy! The trouble is he was jealous. He thought that only the NDP could have overruns. My God, they've been creating overruns since they've been the government, for four years. Every year they have $200 million, $300 million or almost $400 million overruns. But they don't call them overruns; they call them "planned program budgetary surpluses." They have words like "special purpose appropriation funds." That brings us back to the principle of the bill.

The Minister of Transportation and Highways is going to get almost $100 million for accelerated highway construction. That has an interesting ring. I'm never quite sure what it means — "accelerated highway construction" — but it's certainly a worthwhile thing.

AN HON. MEMBER: "Faster roads."

MR. LEVI: Oh, right. That's to get the Minister of Energy, Mines and Petroleum Resources (Hon. Mr. McClelland)

[ Page 2291 ]

back to Langley more quickly. Well, if that's the case, we're prepared to get him a large rubber band and flick him over there. We don't want to spend a lot on blacktop. My gosh, that's expensive.

We've got an interesting item which really is, in fact, a second $5 million grant to the Minister of Industry and Small Business Development (Hon. Mr. Phillips). That's $10 million he's got. Well, he's got all sorts of options now to help Maplewood, to keep that big, bad giant, Cargill, out of the province. He's got $10 million with which he can deal with development in this province. I know that they had a hand in the job of doing something with the Trigull people. Fortunately, today I see the present federal government finally came through. That looks like it's going to go again. That's pleasing to see. Well, what could we expect from that minister? He's got $10 million over and above his budget to spend. Presumably he's not going to spend too much of it on studies, because that department is famous for its studies and things that really don't happen after the studies get up onto the shelves. I want to look at the....

Interjection.

MR. LEVI: Is that Fred Flintstone speaking there? Every now and again you get a mumbling from the caves over there.

MR. BRUMMET: No, I'm just trying to get your members to listen to you.

MR. LEVI: Look, we don't want any mumblings from the caves over there. Go back in, roll the rock in front of it and leave it.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order, please. All hon. members, the member for Maillardville-Coquitlam....

MR. LEVI: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. You've got to protect me from that member. That man must keep quiet. I'm usually very well behaved in this House, but not when he speaks. You ought to drop a net on him one day.

Mr. Speaker, I'd like to turn for a minute to the whole issue of the Minister of Universities, Science and Communications (Hon. Mr. McGeer). This has been a very worthwhile creation in terms of a ministry. There is no fault on that at all; I think that it's something that has needed to be done. Here we have $2 million in one section of the bill and $1 million in another section of the bill, and you begin to wonder why all these $1 million, $2 million and $5 million afterthoughts went into making up the budgetary process. That's what takes away from the new Minister of Finance and his staff the kind of credibility which you have to have in that department when you make up the budget. You can't simply keep doing little addendums. After all, I think I'm right in saying there's a massive bureaucracy attached to the Ministry of Finance whose job is to take a look at the estimate process, the expenditures, revenues, accountability — Treasury Board and support staff. Surely all of this should obviate the necessity for this kind of thing.

Sure, we can go into the political intent of the bill. I'm not sure that the public understands that thing very well. We understand it. We get an opportunity to debate it in terms of what it really is, which really, in a way, tends to show up the inefficiency of the government in developing this budgetary process. But in respect of the Ministry of Universities, Science and Communications, we have for the future the development of research and development, which is a significant factor in our society today, which will do a great deal to contribute to future job possibilities, and that's something that's extremely worthwhile. But, again, why do it this way at all? Because, after all, in that ministry, which is not a very large ministry at all, the expenditures are not that difficult. We're not now talking about the financing of the universities, which has been long planned and laid out and is not a difficult process at all.

Right down at the bottom we have one other item for the Minister of Transportation and Highways (Hon. Mr. Fraser). section (k) is an amount not exceeding $3.4 million — they've sure cut him back here — to the Minister of Transportation and Highways for the purpose of establishing, expanding and improving airport facilities. Yes, that was a program started under a previous Minister of Transportation and Highways which has been carried on. Now that we've got all these upgradings of the airports, perhaps the Minister of Transportation and Highways will tell us in his estimates whether we have any chance of obtaining a provincial airline, which is something worth looking at. I know that the major customer would probably be the government, but it's a worthwhile thing to look at. In this day and age where the plane is so important, is there any consideration being given...? I see this money is all for the establishing, expanding and improving of airport facilities. We would like to look at something that relates to some future forward look on the question of the use of airports.

I understand that my friend from Central Fraser Valley would like to say something. I'll yield the floor to him.

MR. RITCHIE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I'd also like to thank the member who has just given me the floor.

I beg leave to introduce a group of distinguished guests who have just now arrived.

Leave granted.

MR. RITCHIE: We owe a great deal to the senior citizens of this province, Today I am very proud indeed to introduce to the House part of a group visiting the building today and tomorrow. I believe we have 46 with us today. They are members of the Clearbrook Golden Age Society. I would like the House to honour them and welcome them to this chamber.

MR. LEVI: I love the way the member for Central Fraser Valley introduces. He begs leave. It was very nicely done. I thought he was going to introduce a bill.

I want to deal with the notes that the minister has within the bill, which I think are relevant to the kind of thing we've been talking about. He's got an item on the back of page 2: "Unexpended money." It says:

"(1) Any part of the money appropriated under section 1(c) to (n) that may be unexpended at the end of the fiscal year ending March 31, 1981, shall not be expended after that date.

"(2) Notwithstanding any other enactment, the appropriation under section 1...continues in effect until the end of the fiscal year ending March 31, 1982...."

So there's a kind of forward-looking plan of what they're going to do with the money if they don't spend it this year.

[ Page 2292 ]

That's a key thing in what they've been doing in terms of introducing their budget. We went through it under another debate in which there was an enormous amount of money that will be unexpended at the end of this fiscal year. In this section of the bill — and I'm not really going section by section but looking in terms of the general statement — they anticipate that if it's not all expended.... There are those of us over here and those of us in the public who believe that where you have surpluses you have to take a look at your tax structure, and first of all ask if the people are being overtaxed. That's been a long debate since the government has been here for four years.

Overtaxation leads to an increase in revenues, particularly if you've overestimated your expenditures and underestimated your revenues. Consequently the people that suffer are really the people who have to pay the taxes. Bear in mind that even people with low incomes pay taxes in this province. Consequently the kind of planning that appears to have gone into this bill is the rider that if it's not expended at the end of March 1981 it shall not be expended after that date, so presumably what's left over will come back.

But we begin to wonder what it is they have in mind with all the programs, and of course we now know. I think we can well accept that the programs are really not that planned. It would have been far better, in terms of the kind of planning that departments do, to put the money into the general estimate of the department and have them carry on. After all, what we look for in some of the departments is that they are job-creating. If we are dealing with the Ministry of Transportation and Highways we are certainly looking for job creation. They are very large job providers. Regardless of what we might look to in terms of the public sector, the government is still a very large provider of jobs, albeit it on a seasonal basis, but a very important part of the economy.

The thing is that without all of this kind of little details that we get in terms of expenditures, we don't have what the programs are that are behind the expenditures. That's basically the criticism that we have here. What we have is some window-dressing and a lot of financial frippery. Nobody's suggesting that the amounts are not....

Interjection.

[Mr. Hyndman in the chair.]

MR. LEVI: Frippery. It's a kind of word. I think sometimes the Minister of Education (Hon. Mr. Smith) uses the word "piffle," but I would never attach the word "piffle" to money.

It's the way it's done, the style. It's not the money. The money obviously becomes part of the economic lifestream of this province. In some respects it's a little bit insincere the way it's done. We don't really know what they've got in mind, because the rider in the bill says if it's not expended by the end of the year, it's not to be expended afterwards. Well, you don't put that in when you really have some planning, because usually what you look for is that things are going along so well that you really need more money to put into these programs — and not that you're anticipating that you're going to have surpluses. After all, this is what this bill is all about: we have a bill dealing with surplus funds that anticipates a surplus.

That's a very interesting kind of economics — super surpluses. Underestimate, overtax, create surpluses, bring in one bill that will spend some of the surplus, bring in a second bill that will spend some of the surplus, and then in the second bill put a rider that if you have a surplus of that, well, what are you going to do? You'll probably get another one. So it's not the kind of economic planning that one would have expected from the government that is constantly saying that it has an understanding of the bottom line. We hear it from the Minister of Industry and Small Business Development when he is in full flight, Mr. Speaker, when he is telling us about the glories of Social Credit and economic planning — he could probably spend every dollar he could get his hands on. I know that he would never spend it frivolously. He is not a frivolous man, the Minister of Small Business Development, not a frivolous man at all; he is many other things, but he is not frivolous. He wouldn't take the money and just spend it with gay abandon, because he is not like that. But he has never really told us — not really, in all the years he's been the minister — what it is he's ever created. We know what he's destroyed under his ministry, but we don't know, even in this particular bill where he gets $10 million, what he has in mind. He's never told us that, never really demonstrated to us that he's capable of anything.

Now we'll see. We're all waiting to see what happens in the next few days with the announcements in respect to the coal. That will be very worthwhile listening to. Then maybe we'll get up, Mr. Speaker, and we might change our mind — after all, we can all learn from watching the maturation of the minister over the years. You know, he no longer flies, he treads water. He has a different approach now when he speaks. He doesn't wave his arms; he pats his hands up and down, which means that he's beginning to understand a little bit that loudness will not overcome his inability to be a good minister.

We don't know from this bill at all what he's going to do with the extra $10 million. I did make a suggestion before you resumed the chair, Mr. Speaker, that there is an ideal opportunity for that minister to do something about the Maplewood-Cargill situation. We now know that the government is not really interested in having Cargill in the province buying up more companies. We've never had an explanation from the Minister of Agriculture (Hon. Mr. Hewitt) why not, but that's their approach. The bulwark against this kind of thing is this kind of money in the bill — $10 million. How much is going to go to Maplewood? Certainly, I hope, more than the offer to pick up 50 percent of their losses for five weeks. Then I presume that they'll all go into the poor-house after that. We're still waiting; here is an opportunity.

I would have thought that we would have heard from one of the ministers that if the members would only pass this bill, we could put the workers at Maplewood back to work, because within that bill is the money we need to transfer to Maplewood. With reasonable assistance — and, of course, reasonable assistance from the government as we know it, because as free enterprise goes it's not too much.... They get very worried that somehow somebody is going to turn around and say: "That's government involvement. My gosh, that's almost socialism, and we can't have that!" They have enough schizophrenia over there with politics without injecting the accusation that they might just be socialists.

But when we really examine it closely, Mr. Speaker, along with all of the grants that are made by that government, there is an incredible amount of assistance that goes to the private sector. That's okay too; I don't feel badly about that at all. But what I feel badly about is, when there is a constant

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protest from the people over there, that the free enterprise system has to fly by itself with no government involvement whatsoever. I think it's a good thing. If the private sector won't produce, somebody has got to produce it. I've always believed that until the private sector demonstrates otherwise, the employer of last resort is in fact the government, because that's what we have to do constantly as governments. We constantly have to come up with plans for students in the summer, because those jobs can't be created by the private sector for any number of reasons. Perhaps they're not economical; they don't fit into their plans, so the government has to step in.

So gradually, even though they're free enterprisers and they scream at the top of their lungs that they're not involved in the private sector, we know that that's not true. Mr. Speaker, we know that the government is very heavily involved in provision of assistance to the private sector. My gosh, the Ministry of Transportation and Highways all by itself is a great big land-lease program for the private sector. Who creates more opportunity for the private sector than the Minister of Highways? All those miles and miles of accelerated blacktop! He provides all of that money to all of those people that build the roads. Sure, it's the private sector that is building the road; and it's the people who work for them that pay the taxes, along with the companies. But if you talk about that to that group over there, they get a little embarrassed, because somehow they feel there is something wrong if people know that they assist the private sector. I don't think there's anything wrong with it. By all means, let’s assist the private sector. But we don't want the private sector telling us that we can't have government interference.

Mr. Speaker, the other day I cited the example of the government of Canada producing a report about the amount of government assistance that was paid out in 1978. It was put out by the Department of Industry, Trade and Commerce. There was $7.5 billion of direct assistance to the private sector. In that same fiscal year the private sector paid $6.7 billion in corporate taxes. So they're ahead of the game by three-quarters of a billion dollars. That's how much assistance went into the private sector.

When the minister closes the debate, he should tell us whether any of the $10 million that is going to economic development is going to be earmarked for assisting a company like Maplewood — you know, to get back the 124 jobs, to do that kind of development. We haven't heard that. We don't know what is going on behind the scenes. We have all sorts of problems understanding what the minister is really doing. He's not creating jobs. We know that the Minister of Agriculture (Hon. Mr. Hewitt) said that those kinds of decisions are made by the Minister of Industry and Small Business Development (Hon. Mr. Phillips). Well, we'll have to wait. I keep calling him the minister of economic development, because at one time I had expectations that he would be the minister responsible for developing the economy. But I think he now has the right title for his job. He is the minister of small business, with emphasis on the small. He is a small minister with a small portfolio, and I would like him, sometime in the debate.... The Minister of Transportation and Highways (Hon. Mr. Fraser) looks like he's dead keen to get up and debate this bill. So I think that he should get up and tell us just what they have in mind in terms of the $10 million supplementary appropriation — the surplus — that is going to the Minister of Industry and Small Business Development.

I want to make a comment, Mr. Speaker, about the Minister of Labour (Hon. Mr. Heinrich), who will be receiving up to $4.5 million for youth employment and training programs. That is something that we've debated long and hard in this House. We've debated it in reference to the greater provision of apprenticeship programs. I know that there are always problems in terms of creating apprenticeship programs because you have to deal with trade unions that in some cases have provisions that do not allow for the wholesale provision of apprenticeships.

I've often worried and wondered about summer employment programs, because I always get the feeling that while we are dealing with summer employment programs for a group of our young people who are at school — and we have a lot of concern about that — somehow it's not demonstrated in the programs that we create any continuing concern about that young group in our society between 15 and 20 — not even up to 24 — for whom there appear to be no continuing programs. There is no continuing focus on that group. We have a continuing focus on summer employment for students, but we should also be having a continuing focus on employment for people who are not students, particularly for those from 15 to 20. I know that they have to battle with the whole business of Canada Manpower, but I think that people who have been involved in government realize that there are a number of hurdles that people have to go over. Nobody at 15 or 16 or 17 has access to that kind of training. After all, there is always a constant argument over the regulations — you have to have one year in the workforce before you can qualify, and some of these young people never get one year in the workforce.

We do need to develop some very special programs, and I would hope that this is what the Minister of Labour has in mind for this $4.5 million — that it's not just addressed to university students, that it is addressed to people that we rarely talk about. There are a group of people out there who are no longer in school. They're not in trouble, but they're a burden on their family, because they appear to have no future for many years down the road because of their age. They're not in the school system, and they're not really in the workforce. I would like to see us have a continuing program. If we have a summer program for students, then let's have an all-year program for the non-students, because they are people we have to concern ourselves about as well.

The last item that they deal with here is $1 million for the Minister of Lands, Parks and Housing (Hon. Mr. Chabot) — accelerated construction of senior citizens' housing. Well, that's nice. After all those years of developing a program for senior citizens housing, in came a new government in 1976 and out went the development of senior citizens' housing. They just got out of the whole business; now they want to get back into it again. They want to tippy-toe back into the business of providing senior citizens' housing. It is called social housing, Mr. Speaker. Given the fact that we have a high unemployment rate, that we in fact have a housing shortage, the government says they'll put $200 million into a mortgage subsidy scheme. But I don't know that the addition of $1 million is going to make a very significant impact on the senior citizens' housing needs of this province.

All of that surplus — $168 million — could have gone to senior citizens' housing, and the spinoff from that in terms of the forest industry, the construction business, the small businesses that operate around the construction industry, and the employment of the construction trades would have been remarkable. We often question why it is that they don't do it.

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Why don't they take the whole surplus of the Special Purpose Appropriation Act, 1980, and put into parentheses "accelerated senior citizens' housing program" — even take the money away from the accelerated minister over there on highways — and put it into housing? Not everybody can work on the highways, because much of the work that the ministry is doing is outside of the lower mainland. It'd be up north. True, those people need too. But in terms of housing, that's something that a lot of people can do. After all, we have 30 percent of our construction trade unemployed. We have to deal with some kind of priority. That's what we could have done with this — taken all of it and wrapped it into the very last item under (q), which is an accelerated construction program for senior citizens' housing.

Just about when you get wound up with $1 million Mr. Speaker, you've run out of money, because when it's accelerated, it really is accelerated. I don't know that in going through all of these items that.... If they wanted to have credibility in this bill, real credibility in terms of the effort and planning, meeting the kinds of economic crises that we have, they might just have looked at the bottom item and talked about accelerated housing for senior citizens and nothing else. Then it would have been a bill for this side of the House to really contend with, because basically we don't agree with the principle of bringing in bills every time you have a little surplus.

You know how to create surpluses — underestimate your income and revenues — so that's not necessary. That's part of the frippery that goes on. But in terms of changing the thrust of this bill to an accelerated housing program worth $168 million, you would have got the support of this side of the House. Yes, you would have got the support. But there is no way we can support little bits here and there, no way at all.

It's not a question of it being too much or not enough. You keep telling us you've got all this money. You tell us that you're going to have $1 billion in surplus. In the middle of the kind of economic crisis this province is faced with, the answer by that government is that we're going to underexpend. That's what they've said in their budget papers. "We're going to underexpend to the tune of $1 billion." I find that very unprincipled. That's not a question of too little too late. It's all sitting in the bank. It's like BCRIC; it's become a great big savings fund. They're happy to leave it in the bank and pick up just the interest on the money. It's incredible. Why worry about risk? We've got the Premier on the one hand standing up and saying, "Each British Columbian should participate in the risk of this province," but BCRIC doesn't seem to be doing it. They've got it in the bank; there's not much risk there.

MR. KING: They're going to pay the Minister of Tourism (Hon. Mrs. Jordan) out of surplus funds.

MR. LEVI: Oh, right. Well, we could get — and my colleague has just pointed this out to me — a message amendment bill from His Honour the Administrator, in which it will show under item (r) that could go into this bill.... It would probably be entitled: "Special Purpose Appropriation Act, 1980 — Minister of Tourism, Rehabilitation." We really have to restore her, because she's going to be on unemployment insurance very shortly.

Interjections.

MR. LEVI: It's very difficult, Mr. Speaker, to overcome the humour of my colleagues on the front bench there, especially the member for Shuswap, who has such a beautiful Irish belly-laugh. After all, when he laughs, the whole world laughs — even the Minister of Municipal Affairs (Hon. Mr. Vander Zalm), without his green uniform.

In closing, I just want to go back to what I said earlier. If the bill would have been a special appropriations bill related to the business of an accelerated housing program for senior citizens, I have no doubt that this side would have supported the bill wholeheartedly despite how we feel about the whole business of surpluses.

The basis on which you operate in this House is that sometimes you've got to shift from one foot to the other, sometimes back and forward in terms of what it is you look at and what your beliefs are. You can go so far in being flexible. Okay, occasionally in this House we have votes that we all agree on. I know that the people in the galleries sometimes think that when we walk out of the corridor the government....

My gosh, he's back. I want to welcome the Minister of Agriculture (Hon. Mr. Hewitt); he's back. You know, if you'd have got back before, they wouldn't have been in the mess they were in when you weren't here. My God, I never thought I'd ever see the day there would be a vote in this House — 26-26 — and there was the Deputy Speaker not knowing which way to go. He had to get the advice of the Clerks. The only solid piece of advice that came across the House was from the members on the front bench who said: "Put out the writ!" But that advice was not heeded, so consequently we're still in debate.

Interjections.

MR. LEVI: No time limit? I've got another 35 minutes. How are we doing for time, Mr. Speaker? One minute? Okay. Well, I've got it made. I've got one minute in which I can repeat.... Oh, here's the Minister of Intergovernmental Relations (Hon. Mr. Gardom). Garde, where were you when they needed you?

Interjection.

MR. LEVI: I don't know what you were doing over there, but 26-26, my gosh, that's....

Interjections.

MR. LEVI: For those in the gallery who are not familiar with the gentleman that just entered, he is the first member for Vancouver–Point Grey. For 15 years he was the member for Vancouver–Point Grey, and then something happened last year and he became the first member. Now he's Minister of Intergovernmental Relations, and I do welcome him. Am I out of time?

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Yes.

MR. LEVI: That's too bad, because I had so much more to say.

HON. MR. FRASER: I'm very happy to take part in this great debate on Bill 5, special funds appropriation, and certainly to follow my friend from Maillardville-Coquitlam,

[ Page 2295 ]

who has got a distinguished record in our province of having overruns. He was referring to the overruns that we have here. I recall the overruns when that member was a minister, and his explanation for them was that it was a clerical error of $100 million. I want to tell you that we got a better highway system for the overruns that have happened in Highways. You can see what we got for it all over British Columbia today. It also supplied a lot of badly needed jobs in our province. So there's quite a difference between your overruns and ours.

The point I want to make regarding Bill 5 — the $168 million which we are debating — is a little background why it's here in surplus funds. I want to say that I'm very proud to be part of a government which created surplus funds, which were caused by government policy directing the economy of this province.

MR. LEA: From overtaxation.

HON. MR. FRASER: Yes, I've heard those remarks from the negative nellies on that side calling it overtaxation. I would remind you, Mr. Speaker, and the members of this House that we reduced taxes last year, specifically the sales tax, from 5 to 4 percent, and we still came up with a surplus. Therefore, I am proud that our economy was able to generate the funds so we could stand here today and debate a bill like this.

That leads me to another story. The very first paragraph in here.... The only down side in this bill is in section (a), which provides for $26.1 million of debt reduction in British Columbia. If it had been those people when they were government, we would be looking at a deficit bill here today and not a surplus bill, I can assure you. We are still paying for the deficit for the socialist games that we had in this province from 1972 to 1975. We're providing for one of ten instalments to reduce the debt that they created for the citizens of our province in the short time they were government. When they took over government here in British Columbia in 1972, the cookie jar was full, and when they left in 1975 — and they were assisted greatly by the voters of British Columbia, who booted them out — they left behind them a debt of $265 million. This bill provides for a payment on that. As I say, we'd be looking at a deficit bill instead of a surplus bill if they were here, and that's why I'm proud to be part of a government that created this. The people are going to get it all back.

This is absolute nonsense, this "overtaxation." We have some of the lowest taxation rates in Canada, and because our economy is in good shape it generates funds which we can in turn give back to the people of British Columbia in extended services.

The press don't report these things properly, and every day we have people in the gallery who don't even know what we're talking about. I'm trying to explain, particularly to those people, that we are talking here about a special purpose bill created by our good economy in this province, and we're in turn voting it out in this Legislature with this bill.

The next item here is (d) — $100 million for highways. Mr. Speaker, I might be a little biased, but I couldn't think of a better place to spend that.

MR. LOCKSTEAD: You are biased.

HON. MR. FRASER: I am very biased, but it creates jobs, and it also improves our highway system, which, I might say, they left full of potholes. They were filling the potholes with snow, and it's taken quite a while to replace the snow in the potholes with proper paved roads and improve the highways system and add new roads. There is certainly a member here who knows what I'm talking about. I'm referring to the former Minister of Highways, now the MLA for Prince Rupert (Mr. Lea); he knows what I'm talking about. This $100 million in here augments what we call in the Highways ministry the capital side of our budget, and will give us about $308 million for capital works in the fiscal year 1980-81. It has nothing to do with the maintenance side, which is a separate item in our ministry in which.... This year, I believe, we have around $160 million in the Highways ministry budget for maintenance. This $100 million in this bill deals with the capital side only and will let us get on with the stepped-up highway program we've had since 1976 to rebuild our existing roads and build new roads. I think it's better to go into further detail when my estimates come up, but really what it does is give us a little more money than we had in the year just closed, fiscal year 1979-80, by augmenting it with this $100 million.

There are a lot of items in this — aid to small business, research, and so on — that are all excellent, and I think even the other side agrees with that. The item that the member was just talking about, an amount not exceeding $1 million for Lands and Parks to accelerate construction for senior citizens, is excellent, Mr. Speaker. This will allow approval of most of the requests for most of the badly needed senior citizens' housing projects in the province for this year, and will again create jobs, and so on.

I'm happy also to see in here $6.5 million to the Minister of Lands, Parks and Housing (Hon. Mr. Chabot) for accelerated park development. This is badly needed in our province. As the economy has boomed so well and we have new citizens here, we also have a terrific increase in tourism and a further demand on all of our park system. This will help this ministry get along with looking after the increased demands on this very important public service.

Also in here is money for accelerated expenditures for recreation, and that will be welcomed by everyone in our province, I'm sure.

The item in here that I wanted to deal with more than any other — it was referred to by the previous speaker, but it comes under the responsibility of this ministry — is item (k): "An amount not exceeding $3.4 million to the Minister of Transportation and Highways for the purpose of establishing, expanding and improving airport facilities." This program, Mr. Speaker, was started by this government in 1978. The legislation was put through the Legislature and it was started then. There was never before a program for airports in our province. Most airports were — and the major ones still are — under the jurisdiction of the government of Canada through the Department of Transport, but there was a real gap in rural airports and in the upgrading of some more urban airports, so our government developed the policy. As I say, it was introduced here in 1978, a five-year program at an estimated cost of $26 million.

I have had the responsibility of seeing this program go on since late 1978 through 1979. I might tell you that I'm very proud of this small program, and the funds that are in this bill make sure that this program will continue.

Interjection.

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HON. MR. FRASER: Yes, Mr. Member, and I notice when you talk in your riding you never mention it at all; you just say it's all terrible transportation service. But I've never heard you say in your riding that we helped at Bella Coola and at Powell River; you never acknowledge that. Your citizens up there think Ottawa does it. Well, I'm telling them today that we did it, Ottawa didn't do it. But if they listen to their MLA, Mr. Speaker, they'd never know that. They'd still have grass and gravel airstrips.

In any event, he's always hollering about transportation. But when something happens, still nothing has happened as far as he's concerned. I just want to get that on the record. I'm glad he asked about airport assistance. As a matter of fact, I think there is sitting on my desk right now another application from the district of Powell River for further expenditures so that they can get on with further improvements, and you'd better believe that we'll give it worthy consideration. But when I see their member standing here bad-mouthing this bill and this legislation — saying he's going to vote against it.... Wouldn't it affect your thinking if you were the minister in charge, sitting there and saying whether Powell River should get the money or not?

Interjection.

HON. MR. FRASER: They're against it. Wait till they vote. We'll just see whether they'll go home and say: "Yes we voted against better transportation, but we really didn’t mean it." They'll have a reason, I'll tell you.

Interjection.

HON. MR. FRASER: Well, the member's a little upset. I'm just getting to him, because I know how he mouths off tip in his riding — that is, of course, if he's quoted right; but I follow his local press very closely.

Anyway, back to the principle of the $3.4 million in this bill, I'm very proud, as I said, to be part of this. I think it's the only program of its kind in any province in Canada. We have got along quite well, and this will allow that program to go even further. As I've mentioned, we've improved airport services at Powell River, Bella Coola and also in the great metropolis of Nanaimo. We have spent a lot of money upgrading that airport so that there is better fighting, better communication and so on. If they'd had to wait for the government of Canada to do it, they'd have waited a long time.

Another member from a rural area, like myself, is the member for Atlin (Mr. Passarell). He's always hollering about the inadequacy of transportation in his riding, and dealing with this airport program. I've never heard him say that we paved the strip at Stewart. They've got a paved airstrip at Stewart now, thanks to the policies of this government. Presently we're investigating — and hopefully will get it built — a paved airport strip for Dease Lake. I hear him talking all about burning tires to keep warm because of the terrible roads and all that, but he never says anything about these things. So I want to tell you, Mr. Speaker, and the members of this House, that even in the remote areas like this member comes from we're trying to improve their transportation through the Air Transport Assistance Program.

Interjection.

HON. MR. FRASER: Yes, I understand that he also will be voting against the bill. I intend to follow him home whenever he goes back to his riding — my information is that it's very rarely he goes there — and I'll tell his people what we have done for transportation in his riding. I'll give them the real story.

That is just a few of the places. What the program does is upgrade strips — the odd one to gravel, but also to pavement — and directional lighting, and so on. There's very little that we won't approve of as far as the policy is concerned. There is an overall policy that the government doesn't mind getting in on the capital improvements and so on.

We want to deal with a local elected body. In some cases we deal with the regional district, in some cases with a city, but we want to deal with an elected body — make the arrangements with them — so that when all the improvements are done there are local people to look after the operation of these smaller strips. It's worked out very well. Just recently we have also got involved in a study regarding insurance for these local strips, which has been a problem for local authorities, particularly after the unfortunate episode at Cranbrook. Municipalities and regional districts were very concerned to get involved in the operation of airstrips because of the legal obligation, and I'm happy to tell the House that we've had a study done on this. Now we've found a way that the municipalities can get together, and they'll be assisted. I would like to publicly thank the B.C. Aviation Council for doing this project and advising us on it so that we can get reasonably priced liability insurance to cover these smaller strips in the province of British Columbia.

I would just like to say that the member for Maillardville Coquitlam (Mr. Levi), when he referred to this subject in this bill, wanted to know whether we are going into the airline business. Mr. Speaker, the answer is no. We have no intention of going into the airline business through this fund or any other fund. What we are trying to do with the funds in this Air Transport Assistance Program is to try to upgrade our air services and then encourage regional carriers so that they have the facilities to land and take off and bring more and better transportation services to the more remote areas of British Columbia. I have mentioned a few such as Stewart and Dease Lake. We have done some work at Bella Coola. In the case of Bella Coola, for example, it was difficult there. They had a scheduled airline service, but it was difficult because of inadequate airport services. They now have a regular daily service from Bella Coola to Williams Lake because of the upgrading of airports from this program. That gives better transportation to the citizens. I don't see why all the urban citizens have to have all the best. We are trying to make the rural and semi-rural person have some of the facilities of airline travel as well if they so choose.

The other item we are trying to strive with in this program, Mr. Speaker, is the government air services. It comes under this ministry, and they provide the finest service I know in bringing upgraded health care, if required, to remote areas of the province. We have a fleet of eight aircraft, four of them jets. We have 25 of the best pilots in Canada with a total staff of 80 mechanics and dispatchers, and so on. I can't speak highly enough about the work that these people do bringing health-care facilities on the order of a doctor to places like Fort Nelson. They take a person that needs higher medical care and they bring it to them if they are a long way away from Victoria or Vancouver. They bring the stretcher case down in an hour and a half on these government jets. We

[ Page 2297 ]

had in mind on the Air Transport Assistance Program to make available these smaller airports so our government jets can go in there to more places than they can go now.

I might say that the government will be faced with a problem because we'll have to buy more and get more pilots. They are flying night and day now, seven days a week on this service, but we are trying to expand it even further so that none of our citizens are denied the highest health care required from wherever they live in this province. I wanted to get that word out because I am very proud of our air services, particularly on the ambulance side.

Recently we have converted two of the jets and doubled the width of the doors. They were having problems with stretchers on the standard door and we have just doubled the size of doors on two of them, so two of our jets will be practically 100 percent on air services throughout the province. All this goes hand in glove with the program we are discussing here. We must have better airstrips for this equipment, not only for the individual owner — there might be a logger who has his own plane — but to bring a higher level of health service as well, as I say, if required hospital facilities aren't available or so on. That is going on.

I just say in closing, Mr. Speaker, because I know there'll be a lot of discussion under my individual ministry vote, that as a member of this government I am proud of this bill and proud of how the funds became available. I am also watching with keen interest to see how the members of the opposition vote. I am sure that most British Columbians are watching and I'm pretty sure from what I hear.... I've listened to their stories which they twist and turn in this House on this bill and everything else. They're going to vote against it. I only hope they don't change their mind and they do vote against it. We'll go out and tell the citizens of British Columbia that want these services who supported them and who didn't.

MR. PASSARELL: I haven't seen the lion of the Legislature wound up like that since the last time we were up in the Ned DeBeck lounge watching "The Three Stooges."

Mr. Speaker, concerning Bill 5, it was interesting to hear the comments from the Minister of Highways concerning the first time he ever drove up on Highway 37, and he had four flat tires within the first few miles and needed a helicopter to come and pick him up.

HON. MR. FRASER: Mr. Speaker, a point of order. That is not a true statement and I want it withdrawn.

MR. PASSARELL: I'm sorry. I'll withdraw that — it was only three flat tires.

Going back, the senior member of the Legislature spoke about a debt. I could see how this provincial government could get into debt, especially when you look at the last two sessions of the House, Mr. Speaker, when this government has allocated $1.4 billion to increase Hydro's debt to $6 billion. I could see how you could get involved in debts. Supposedly, this is a government of businessmen, be it used-car salesmen or hardware store owners.

Concerning highways, it's encouraging to see that the Highways minister has been able to use his charm to get an extra $100 million out of this government. I have to congratulate my friend, the Cariboo cougar, for using his charm in getting this increased. I know he's going to put this entire $100 million, Mr. Speaker, up into Atlin. I can just tell from the smile and the twinkle in his eyes. But when the paving costs are running in excess of almost $1 million a mile in the north, I would expect that the Highways minister would use his vast influence with the younger leader of the government to get more than a few miles paved up north.

[Mr. Strachan in the chair.]

In section 3 of this bill, Mr. Speaker, there is $5 million to help small businessmen in the metropolitan areas of this province. I was wondering why the member for South Peace River (Hon. Mr. Phillips) is discriminating against the small businessmen of the province who live outside the lower mainland. Doesn't the member care about the small businessmen in Dawson Creek or Rolla or Pouce Coupe? They might be manufacturing something other than hot air balloons that fizzle out once they get down to Victoria. So I would hope that the $5 million would not go for metropolitan areas for business development, but for secondary industry in the rural areas of this province. There is a need to help small businessmen outside the metro areas. This bill offers little to those dedicated entrepreneurs of the province.

Section 4 of the bill, Mr. Speaker, is the Science Council. I'm just wondering if these moneys are going for the development of elementary school science research programs, or to develop horoscopes. Or is the Science Council using moneys allocated in this section of the budget to do a science study on the feasibility of putting a tunnel between Vancouver and Victoria?

Section 5 also allocates $1 million to the B.C. Research Council. I'm just wondering why the minister of universities and small brains doesn't include this in the estimates of his proper part of the budget.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Hon. member, that comment was unparliamentary. I'll have to ask you to withdraw that.

MR. PASSARELL: I'm sorry, Mr. Speaker — what was the comment?

DEPUTY SPEAKER: It was an unparliamentary reference made to a member of this House.

MR. PASSARELL: Whatever I said about the minister of education...universities....

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Universities, Science and Communications is the title.

MR. PASSARELL: I said small brains. I withdraw that.

Section 6, Mr. Speaker — another $1 million. Is this to research an exhaust pipe, once again between Vancouver and Victoria? Or to research improvements, maybe, in the research staff of that ministry — to do research on literary skills involved in correspondence? Maybe that's where the $1 million is going to.

Section 7 — $2 million for science research again. I'm wondering why this total was not included in the Minister of Universities' estimates — the third of the minister's liabilities. Let's look at what this $2 million could be used for. Not knowing what the Minister of Universities is using the $2 million for, we can only put it in theory. Maybe he's going to buy some equipment, and this equipment's going to be an underwater mole machine for $2 million, or he could buy a

[ Page 2298 ]

propane spaceship for $2 million. It's hard to understand what the minister is using this $2 million for.

Section 8 — Provincial Secretary — $5 million. I'm wondering if the Provincial Secretary is going to use this $5 million for funding of the First Citizens Fund to increase that allocation to the native people of this province. I would also hope that this $5 million isn't going for the First Citizens Fund and that they would allocate the $5 million for playfields in the north — a very touchy issue up there. I'm certainly sure that the member for North Peace River (Mr. Brummet) would join with me if that $5 million went for School Districts 81 and 87 to improve recreational facilities for the school districts in those two northern parts of the province.

Section 9 — the airport assistance. It's a good idea for rural areas, and once again the senior statesman from the Cariboo has wielded his power to the good of the people of the north.

But let's look at two programs and the effect they're having upon the constituency of Atlin. The minister mentioned Dease Lake. They are expanding a dirt strip to over 5,000 feet. That's correct, Mr. Minister. The community of Dease Lake is still quite upset about why the airport has to be built over the only cemetery in the community.

HON. MR. FRASER: That was all straightened out.

MR. PASSARELL: Well, I don't know if it's all been straightened out, having been there last week; there are still a lot of hard feelings about the expansion of the runway. But I would take the word of the minister that it would be straightened out.

It was interesting to note, talking with some of the people up there last weekend concerning the airport, that one man had stated that a Cat operator on the equipment which was used to expand that runway to 5,000 feet used to start up the Cat and go to sleep for six hours. Another part is that the expanding of the airstrip has caused quite a hard feeling in the community because it has gone by the only subdivision in the community of Dease Lake.

In Atlin there is another concern, and I have written the Minister of Transportation and Highways numerous letters concerning the conflict of interest involved with the airport expansion. There are problems associated with the expansion, contracts and approvals given to an organization in Atlin that represents a political party. I still haven't received answers to letters I've written to the minister. You're quite aware of the letters that I've sent to you, Mr. Minister. There hasn't been any free and honest debate in the community of Atlin concerning the need and the feasibility of the airstrip. It has simply been done by a political organization in the community that picked up the contract and now is starting to play a little payola. I certainly would hope that the minister would look into the investigation up there of money transactions going on between members of a political party for their own benefit.

Section 10 — $2.65 million for a refugee settlement act. This is a good move and I congratulate the minister on this aspect. I would certainly hope that it would go to help new Canadians from all parts of the world, Mr. Speaker, that they may become citizens of this great country of ours. Moneys were allocated years ago, and I wonder if they were ever spent. If my recollection is true there was $5 million at one time for refugees.

Section 11 — $1.8 million for the Minister of Energy, Mines and Petroleum Resources (Hon. Mr. McClelland) to construct this Sierra-Yoyo road up in northeast British Columbia. Has this government developed a program that each time a multinational company needs road access they bend over and pick up the tab? Because quite a few companies up in northwestern British Columbia would certainly like to have grants by the provincial government to build roads into their operations.

Interjection.

MR. PASSARELL: Mr. Speaker, could you protect me from the wrath of the member for North Peace River? He will have his turn to talk. He can sit back there and be quiet for a while, show a little courtesy in the House.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The member for Atlin on Bill 5.

MR. PASSARELL: Thank you, Mr. Speaker, for protecting me.

What about the small mining operations like Erickson Gold Mining Corp., who must pay for cost of their own road access? I would certainly hope that the government would show some kind of leniency to mining operations up in northwestern British Columbia to pay part of the cost of road construction into their sites.

Section 12 — $1.2 million for the Minister of Education (Hon. Mr. Smith) for the development of delivery services for educational opportunities. Why isn't this included in the Minister of Education's estimates? Is this a carryover or white elephant from the Minister of Universities, Science and Communications? This $1.2 million could be spread out to rural areas of this province to help them benefit school children without recreational facilities.

Section 13 — $6.5 million for the Minister of Lands, Parks and Housing (Hon. Mr. Chabot). It's a shame he's not in his seat now. Why isn't this included in the minister's estimates, and who has this been promised to? What is the $6.5 million for Lands? One good thing that I would like to see, Mr. Speaker, is $3 million of this program being used for park development at Sidney Island. The government could secure this island for a little less than $3 million, a park that would generate revenue as well as providing a recreational opportunity to residents of the capital region. This matter, Mr. Speaker, will be discussed during the appropriate estimates where it belongs and not, as this bill tries to do, in a special appropriations act.

Section 14 — $4.5 million for youth employment opportunities. Six years ago the NDP government of the province allocated almost $30 million for a youth employment program. Taking into consideration that thousands and thousands of youths in this province are unemployed, this program allocation of $4.5 million is much too small.

Instead of spending almost $6.5 million to put projects in this bill for the whims of the Minister of Universities, Science and Communications, I would rather see that money go to the youth under section 14, to increase that estimate from $4.5 million to over $11 million.

Lastly, Mr. Speaker, section 15 — that's $1 million to the Minister of Lands, Parks and Housing for senior citizens' housing. Once again I congratulate the minister for doing something, at least. But the average cost of homes in this province being somewhere between $50,000 and $70,000,

[ Page 2299 ]

$1 million doesn't build too many homes. For construction costs one couldn't even build a 45-room senior citizens' home out of this fund. To the senior citizens of this province, it's almost like getting into a lottery, where they have a one in 10,000 chance to receive anything from this program for senior citizens.

In conclusion, every one of these items should be included into the minister's estimates where they belong. One of my concerns, looking at this, is why.... What about the poor ministers who fell out of grace with the Premier? For instance, the Minister of Agriculture (Hon. Mr. Hewitt) — why isn't there anything included in the appropriation for him? What did he do wrong? Or the Minister of Health (Hon. Mr. Mair)? There's nothing included in Health estimates here. Or the Minister of Tourism (Hon. Mrs. Jordan), and to go further than that, eight other ministers?

I'd rather see us using the provincial moneys to benefit areas of this province that have gone without for years, specifically the north. I'd rather see $168 million thrust into the north to provide services that are presently not in place. This money could be used for the north.

MR. HALL: In discussing Bill 5 with you, Mr. Speaker, it occurs to me that if we look back over the history of the financial bills that have become before us in this Legislature this last 20 years or so, we can see how the genesis of Bill 5 has been traced. We can see its parentage in, first of all, the Social Credit administration from 1952 to 1972, and it will come as no surprise to observers of the financial scene in this province to realize that when we dealt with budgeting and when we dealt with surplus accounts, the first and second years of the New Democratic Party administration, in the main, followed the kind of budgetary practices that were exercised for some years before that. We saw, in 1969, 1970, 1971, 1972 and 1973, the creation of some special funds and special bills applied to those funds for special purposes.

Here, Mr. Speaker, we've seen a departure from that kind of tradition. What we've seen in Bills 5 and 7 is a complete mixing of the principles that operated in the governments from 1960 onwards and, indeed, the government from 1972 onwards. Now we've got perhaps the worst of all possible worlds. Instead of seeing a budgeting procedure start at the turn of the year, by establishing what is required for estimates to run the business of this province and taking into account the anticipated surpluses by the normal budgeting methods of anticipating those surpluses and, in effect, asking the departments to go their best lick and produce a set of estimates that reflect what is likely to happen, we've seen this kind of lottery take place now for the second year on the run, in which money that should normally go into estimates has been put forward in a bill like this and also in a bill like Bill 7.

There are many of us who see certain aspects of Bill 7 and Bill 5 as worthy of support. On both sides of the House there are really.... If we could take a section-by-section free vote, there would be a number of people on both sides of the House that would be of differing opinions as to the worth of each of those sections. As a result we've got the worst kind of budgeting and the worst kind of financial debate.

Instead of adopting, as a new, crisp government, newly elected with a very slim mandate and a slim majority in 1979, zero-based budgeting or some new techniques with a new minister, they've taken the simple, old-fashioned method of incremental budgeting. They've taken the anticipated surpluses and dashed them at the estimates in some fashion, none of which is really rational. On top of that they've produced another bill — Bill 7 — which seeks to set up special purpose funds.

Mr. Speaker, that's not the way, in my view, to budget for the 1980s. It’s not the way in which to see the job that we all want to see done next year accomplished. A lottery among the members of the treasury benches over there for some extra money for estimates, a "money for marks'' program controlled by the Premier, is not, in my view, the best way of handling the estimates of this province.

It's bad budgeting. It's bad bookkeeping. It's a bad principle. It's bad planning from a programmatic point of view. There is no doubt about that. There is no doubt that if you talk to comptrollers, if you talk to the people that we've been listening to — for instance, the public accounts Committee.... That's not the way to build up a sustained approach to the programs that this government wants to put into operation.

It also introduces for the first time a new element, one which I hope the minister perhaps would address in his summing up of this second reading debate. I don't necessarily anticipate he's going to answer every debating point in second reading. We can do that from time to time throughout his estimates anyway. But it does introduce a new element in debate, because I can't remember ever seeing him print in a bill introduced by a government the anticipated surpluses of a surplus being carried forward into a fiscal year one fiscal year away. In other words, this bill contemplates a surplus from this bill in fiscal 1982. I’d like to know how the Minister of Finance anticipates showing the unexpended portions of, at least, the $12 million contained in sections (o), (p) and (q) as surpluses in his books. That's a brand new principle which we've never seen before.

In fact, if this is the beginning of five-year budgeting and the beginning of something new, I hope the minister will take some time out in summation of the debate on second reading and tell us if we are getting into a brand new form of budgeting through the back door, perhaps, by talking about surpluses in fiscal 1982. The $12 million in those particular sections can be delayed right through until March 31, 1982, and I'd like to know how he's going to show that in the books; under what heading, and how are we going to account for that?

If, indeed, there's an argument to be made — and I believe there is — that surpluses are bad bookkeeping and are in effect excess taxation, then by all that's right and proper we should be thinking about what we're doing when we've got surpluses from fiscal 1979-80 still showing as surpluses in fiscal 1982. It doesn't strike me as being particularly smart bookkeeping by a group of people who have tried to say they're the best bookkeepers in the world. I reject that claim, and I reject the claim of this bright, shiny new minister.

I also point out that in actual fact this is really a piece of paper we're debating here, which has very little worth. The fact of the matter is that if we look at this time last year, similar debate was taking place, and if we look at the money which was supposed to be spent, we see that it wasn’t spent. For all that we can vote yes or no.... The member for North Peace River (Mr. Brummet) seems very anxious to vote yes and support his government through thick and thin.

Interjection.

[ Page 2300 ]

MR. HALL: He's trying to tell us what he believes in, and it took him two seconds.

All I'm saying is that last year, for instance, we voted for $5 million for the Minister of Economic Development. He didn't spend a dime.

Interjection.

MR. HALL: Now he's chirping up. He's been silent all day. I wonder if he'd just listen, and then he can answer.

Last year we voted $5 million for that minister to spend for one of these programs, and not a nickel was spent.

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: What a bunch of...! That's not true.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order, please.

MR. HALL: I've been referring to the printed statements of his own government, which show that by December 31, 1979, not a nickel of that money was spent. That's the latest figure we have; nothing else has been presented to us. Now he's got to stand or fall on that.

Is the same $5 million being processed over and over again? We'll be here again processing this same $186 million over and over again. It's the same old shell game: first you see it, then you don't. You've got a bill which, in effect, rewards ministers through some money-for-marks program that allows them extra money to spend in their estimates without any zero-base budgeting or any accountability in the sense of proper estimates and proper estimate control; that allows, in fact, for funds to be set up in one piece of legislation, accompanied without regulations of any kind. This is the worst kind of legislative procedure I can think of, which deals with over $300 million of the taxpayers' money. On top of that, we're talking about it not being spent until fiscal 1982. That's not good, and I can't support that kind of bookkeeping or planning.

Sure, we can support accelerated park development. There is nobody who spent more money on accelerated park development than the government between 1972 and 1975. I can't help but have a desire to support programs which will put young people to work, and there wasn't a government that spent more money for that purpose than the government between 1972 and 1975. In the other bill, I can't help but feel a healthy desire to spend more money on libraries. There wasn't a government that spent more money on libraries than the one between 1972 and 1975. We did it through the estimates.

Interjection.

MR. HALL: No, we did not borrow the money to do it. We did it honestly, up front, through the estimates — not in rubbish like this — so that the examination of the accounts afterwards could be up front with the public accounts Committee, with everybody involved — not sprinkled through a piece of paper which is really not worth very much.

Interjections.

MR. HALL: I seem to have awakened the sleeping members.

Mr. Speaker, this isn't the way to budget in the eighties; it's not in keeping with the speeches made by the Minister of Finance on budget day. I honestly urge him to reconsider the error of his ways and get on with the kind of thing that he was supposed to be doing by virtue of his speech on budget day — the kind of thing that we have heard from the auditor-general and the kind of thing we've heard from one of the staff of the comptroller-general. I can't support Bill 5.

MRS. DAILLY: Mr. Speaker, I think the past member certainly articulated extremely well the concerns that the members on this side of the House have with this bill, as have the other past members.

This afternoon I again re-read — to keep it fresh in my mind, Mr. Speaker — the earlier debate on this bill, and I read very carefully the Minister of Finance's remarks when he introduced this bill and spoke on it in this reading we're now in. You know, there is no way, in reading through his speech, that one can see any evidence for the necessity for this bill to be presented to us in this manner. I think the minister who presented this bill himself had some difficulty in being able to introduce it to the floor of the House. As a matter of fact, he simply went through each item — as anyone else could do here — and listed what each item apparently was for, without any elaboration. In other words, this minister has almost become a superminister, because he's standing up and he's the one who apparently has his finger in all the estimates; he has all the estimates at his finger control, and he's the one who is apparently supposed to know the most about them.

What really bothers me, Mr. Speaker, is that the only member across the floor who actually tried to explain what his money was doing here —

Interjection.

MRS. DAILLY: — and I think he just said something nice about me, so I'm going to do the same for him — is the Minister of Industry and Small Business Development (Hon. Mr. Phillips). He did a terrible job of it; but you know, he did attempt to explain. He is the only minister over there who has decided that he has something to do with this bill. And yet, when you look through the bill, it's almost a whole budget; it's over half the ministers in the cabinet, and yet we haven't heard from many of them. So I come back to the superminister, the Minister of Finance; he's the one who's going to have to explain to us in detail just what all these items are doing here.

One of the travesties of presenting a bill to the floor of the House in this form is that we could carry it to a situation where, once this bill has been passed, we don't know that we're going to have the right to question the ministers in detail about these additional estimates. They're not in their estimates, Mr. Speaker; they're in a bill that's going to be passed. In other words, I consider it almost a form of closure on this Legislature. We are being closed out and not given the opportunity to properly debate $168 million of public tax money. Those members across the floor have delighted in saying we'll vote against it. Of course we'll vote against it. We're not going to be part of a bill that is straight politics and is a travesty in this House, that is not even paying any attention to the fundamental principles of accountability on the floor of this House. Where are we going to be able to debate this? This is one of the main reasons we can't support it.

[ Page 2301 ]

I noticed the Minister of Highways (Hon. Mr. Fraser), who got to his feet and spoke. There is one member I forgot, who also attempted to talk about his portfolio. Actually, he really didn't; he spent most of his time debating this bill, talking about the NDP. Of course, we're used to that now. But the public of British Columbia is getting a little tired of the old record being played over and over again in this House. Mr. Speaker, you know what that Minister of Highways actually said this afternoon in debate on this bill? I want to repeat what he said; I'm paraphrasing because I don't have Hansard yet, but the Minister of Highways actually said: "I hope that the members of the opposition will vote against this bill." Can you imagine that, Mr. Speaker? On the bill that his government is bringing into this House, they are actually suggesting to us that we must vote against it. Do you know why he wanted us to vote against it? He didn't even stop at that, Mr. Speaker, and this will all be recorded in Hansard. He actually went on to say: "I hope those people vote against it so that we can go around the province and tell everyone they voted against it." Isn't that a great level of debate and isn't that really a very, very interesting way for a minister to analyze a bill? He actually suggests that the opposition vote against it. I can assure you we intend to vote against it; we had intended to vote against it long before that minister spoke.

Many of our other members have elaborated on the various reasons. It is a straight political bill, and if it isn't just all politics, the only other explanation for it is complete ineptitude. We've seen an example this afternoon of ineptitude by this government in another area, which I'm sure will be discussed further. But if this government can't handle their estimates and arrange a good estimate book for this House without having to turn around and present a bill, after we've been given the estimate book, for supplementary estimates of over $100 million, Mr. Speaker.... If they can't handle their affairs better, they are incompetent. Yet that is the party which loves to run around this province talking about incompetency in the former government. I think all we have to do come the next election is let the record speak for the ineffectiveness of that government in even presenting proper estimates before this House.

I'm so concerned that we're not going to have a chance to even talk to the ministers whose departments and ministries are being discussed in this bill that I just want to say to the Minister of Finance — since he has been appointed the superminister who must know all — that I hope before he takes his seat in conclusion he will go into great detail, far more detail than he did before, on what these moneys are going to go for. For example, I'm sure, the Minister of Universities, Science and Communications (Hon. Mr. McGeer) would be most interested in finding out in detail how over $6 million is being spent for additional scientific research. We as members of this House would like the details on that, so I hope the Minister of Finance will be able to support us with those details. Because if he doesn't tell us, have we any guarantee, once this bill is passed, that we are going to be able to find out anything about these supplementary estimates? Unless we can have that guarantee, we must simply have the answers from the superminister who's been given this bill to be put through the House.

Here I see $2.65 million for a Refugee Settlement Program. Well, what about that program. We'd like to be part of it. We were all elected to represent the people of British Columbia through our own ridings, and yet this is a mockery of accountability. Are we going to be able to find out what that money is being spent on, and where, and how it's being handled? We hope the Minister of Finance will tell us.

The Accelerated Park Development Program is over $6 million. If we can’t get to the Minister of Lands, Parks and Housing (Hon. Mr. Chabot) on this, then again I must ask the Minister of Finance to elaborate for us in great detail. Because that's what we'd like to know, Mr. Speaker: just why this money was necessary. I'm sure it is for parks, but we'd like to hear why, where and how it's going to be spent.

We can go through this whole bill, and I can see questions popping up.... But where do we get the answers? Apparently we're not going to be able to get the answers from the ministers who are involved. Our lead-off speaker, the member for Nanaimo (Mr. Stupich), made the point in his opening remarks on this bill. He said it apparently means that someone in charge — whoever it is over there — does not have any faith or confidence in the ministers to run their own departments and to explain them. Instead we're given a bill by the Minister of Finance with all this supplementary money. What is wrong with this government? Are they incapable of presenting proper estimates to this House or is it indeed true, as the Minister for Transportation and Highways stated...?

It is a straight political bill. They want the opposition to vote against it so they can run around the province and say: "They voted against parks; they voted against senior citizens' housing." Mr. Speaker, that's old hat. The official opposition is no longer concerned with that kind of politics. If you want to play that kind out there on the campaign trail, go ahead. The people of British Columbia can see through it. They saw through it; they're going to see through it....

HON. MR. CURTIS: Do you remember when you did the same thing on this side, Eileen? You made the same statement on this side of the House and you remember it.

MRS. DAILLY: I do not recall ever making a similar statement on that side of the House when I was there. You are the government now. I'm not the one who's fielding this bill; I'm not responsible for this bill.

HON. MR. CURTIS: No, but your argument is hollow. You remember that statement being made by ministers of the former government....

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order! The member for Burnaby North has the floor.

MRS. DAILLY: As I said again, this is the government, you are the government. If you're happy with this kind of travesty and mockery and if you're going to run around the province and suggest the NDP is against many fine programs, so be it on your head. I am just proud, Mr. Speaker, to belong to a party that isn't afraid of that.

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: You're just disappointed we have a surplus to be able to bring this bill in. You don't want the economy to work. Even your leader said so in Halifax.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The Minister of Industry and Small Business Development will come to order, please. The member for Burnaby North has the floor on Bill 5.

[ Page 2302 ]

MRS. DAILLY: Thank you. I am just proud, Mr. Speaker, to belong to a party that isn't afraid of those accusations and falsities, which I'm sure will be spread by some of those members over there during the next coming campaign. We are not afraid, because we do put accountability, responsibility and the manner of even running a Legislature ahead of that. I am proud to take my place in this debate and say that we are going to vote against this bill because we are voting against it on very solid principles, and not for the reason the Minister of Transportation and Highways asked us to.

[Mr. Davidson in the chair.]

MR. STRACHAN: I ask leave of the House to introduce a guest.

Leave granted.

MR. STRACHAN: Thank you very much. Hon. members, I would like to introduce my father, Bill Strachan.

MR. COCKE: I have a number of concerns about this bill, not the least of which is the old question of accountability. One of the things that I note today is that the old guard Liberals aren't here. I can remember the days when the Minister of Universities, Science and Communications (Hon. Mr. McGeer), the now-Attorney-General (Hon. Mr. Williams) and the Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs (Hon. Mr. Gardom) used to get up in this House in utter horror over being asked to vote for a bill that produced money outside of the expenditures in estimates in this House. They used to suggest that there was no accountability from government under those circumstances. They used to suggest that there was no accountability from Hydro and other Crown agencies, and they refused to vote for these bills. Now they are going to be in here voting for this bill eventually, but it is sure a dramatic change. It is called walking the road to Damascus and seeing the burning bush. And the burning bush in this case is the new Socred rules that you have to adopt by virtue of your change of political priorities.

Mr. Speaker, it doesn't change things. I think that the part of this bill that I resent the most is the first portion of the $26.1 million, the reduction of provincial unmatured debt. That was a beauty. That was the portion of the bill that is now being suggested to be the one that will pay off some debts that were left by the past government. I listened to the accountant from Penticton, the now-Minister of Agriculture (Hon. Mr. Hewitt), who when he was running a credit union couldn't lend any more than $2,000 without going to his board of directors. He was telling us that we went broke. What a bunch of nonsense. He did as badly then as he is doing now, and he's doing as badly now as he did then in terms of his actually presenting what was real.

Just after that election in 1975 I was Minister of Health. I had a number of phone calls from hospitals telling me that they had been instructed by government to spend as much as they humanly could. Some were ordered to spend as much as $10 million, and one of them was right here in this town. You people recall that I brought this information forward. It died on the vines, but they spent like drunken sailors. The Social Credit government that was elected in 1975 until the fiscal year 1976-77 spent in a way that was utterly unsurpassed. "Money for anything, but spend it because it would come under our financial year." Money for anything at all. Spend it. The only person that probably didn't have the ability to go out and do the job was the Minister of Industry and Small Business Development, but everybody else was given their orders and they did it and they did a fine job of it.

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: You wouldn't have any trouble if you could lose $180 million in one year.

MR. COCKE: Then they called a group of chartered accountants in.

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: What a farce — $180 million in one year and you stand up.... You should hang your head in shame.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order, please.

MR. COCKE: You had legislation that was correcting that — the ten cents for the gas tax. There was $200 million owing from the provincial government to ICBC any time they needed it.

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: Recouped a $180 million loss.

MR. COCKE: The fact that they didn't need it, as you showed.... Mr. Speaker, just so this member can remember, I will go over the whole situation at that time. The $181 million is what he is talking about.

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: The $181 million loss.

MR. COCKE: The $181 million — you needed it badly. They lent it to ICBC and then borrowed it back the very next day. So ICBC desperately needed that money. We knew they didn't need it in their cash flow and we didn't use it in their cash flow.

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: You don't know the difference between a cash flow and a loss. I wouldn't want you to sell a used car for me.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order, please, hon. members. The member for New Westminster has the floor. I would ask other members to do him the courtesy of allowing him to continue in his discussions on the bill presently before us.

MR. COCKE: Mr. Speaker, the Minister of Industry and Small Business Development gets very upset from time to time.

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: I'm getting sick and tired of you throwing that garbage across the floor.

MR. COCKE: He gets very upset from time to time. He has absolutely no manners and never has had. He uses his time to sit and try to hassle members that are on their feet, having secured the floor in the proper way. He doesn't bother to give any proper information and he expects us to admire and respect his person. His office, we can understand, should command some respect. But the problem is that he is doing a disservice to that office. His behaviour is just about as bad as that of the member for Omineca (Mr. Kempf). You have to really stress....

[ Page 2303 ]

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: I rescued this office from the brink of disaster that you had it going toward. That's why you can debate this bill today.

MR. COCKE: Mr. Speaker, the way that minister rescued this province from the brink of disaster was to find himself in a nice steam-bath in Japan and come home empty-handed. That's the way he rescued himself.

HON. MR. FRASER: That's why you got thrown out.

MR. COCKE: He even got thrown out of a steam-bath.

AN HON. MEMBER: Remember December 10, 1975?

MR. COCKE: Mr. Speaker, it was during that period, from near the end of December 1975 until March 31, 1976, that we saw record spending in our province. Then, to add to the travesty, they gave a firm of accountants the rules to run by in coming up with a fiscal report on this province — an insult to the comptroller of our province. Naturally they couldn't get the kind of information they wanted out of Public Accounts or out of our comptroller, because it didn't sit. So they took a biased report to the people and suggested that the former government had put the province into jeopardy finance-wise. As a matter of fact, they talked about us being broke.

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: Not only jeopardy — on the brink of financial disaster.

MR. COCKE: Mr. Speaker, the assets of this province rose during the time we were government as has never been paralleled since, nor was it paralleled before. We enriched this province so much and this government has tried their very best to reduce the assets but they haven't managed; even with their incompetence they haven't managed. We left this province in good shape and we hope to find it in good shape when we get back to government. Surely we are going to get back to government with the kind of incompetence that we see going on. Bungle, bungle — day after day. We saw an illustration of it just a little while ago in this House.

It is very difficult for us to sit here and vote for a bill.... As a matter of fact, we just can't vote for a bill that is going to pay off a debt that was created by the government that is now in power, not the government that was in power prior to December 1975. Plastic debt, Mr. Speaker, just like their plastic ministers — that is precisely what we have here. And they are asking us to vote $26.1 million to reduce that plastic debt.

There is another area or two here. I'm not going to argue how much of this is going to be expended. We knew by the budget that under another bill that is very similar a very small proportion is going to be expended — just by virtue of the fact that the government acknowledged what they expected to be in those accounts at the end of fiscal 1981. This one doesn't give that kind of suggestion. What it does tell us is that if they don't spend it during the time between now and the end of this fiscal period, the money goes back to treasury. I'm here to bet that the money under the Ministry of Universities, Science and Communications will not be going back to treasury. That favourite minister, the Minister of Universities, Science and Communications, seems to be sort of a grey eminence over there. They don't like to make him too prominent politically, because he's a Liberal and therefore he's not very well liked by some of the grass roots. But I'll tell you, he's a very powerful minister. I suggest that this $6.5 million which they are giving him for research and equipment is going to be spent, mostly at UBC. UBC is becoming a monument of that minister, and the health services out there are a further monument to that minister. I'll be going into a great deal of detail with respect to those services out there. But what this minister is doing....

AN HON. MEMBER: Will it be the same type of hogwash you're throwing across the floor now?

MR. COCKE: "The same type of hogwash," that minister says. They have created a monster hospital which is going to cost between $500 and $600 per patient day to operate, with the Vancouver General running at $175 to $180. You talk about hogwash? You people bungled again.

AN HON. MEMBER: You're against hospital care.

MR. COCKE: Hospital care. What are you talking about? That's the most exquisite monument ever thought of to the Minister of Universities, Science and Communications.

HON. MR. PHILLIPS: You're against everything, you thoughtless socialist.

MR. COCKE: You better watch yourself. You know, Mr. Speaker, it's unfortunate that this insulting, incredible human being sits in this House and talks the way he does just because of the fact that he doesn't like to listen to facts.

The Minister of Universities, Science and Communications will very likely expend the $6.5 million. I wouldn't mind in the least seeing this province expend $6.5 million on science and technology equipment and research providing I was assured that there'd be a report back, but we're getting no assurances of any reports back. When the end of the fiscal period occurs. we will not know what has been spent, nor will we know that that which has been spent has been spent. How can anybody go home and account to their electors and say that I am a satisfactory member of the Legislature if I can't go home and take back the information which should be made public?

This government was supposed to be an open government and were elected on the basis that they were an open government, and they are a secret government, hiding everything they possibly can. If they had the opportunity, they would rip up the estimates and not give us any opportunity to review what they're doing. Mr. Speaker, I suggest to you that we're establishing a dangerous practice and a very dangerous precedent.

In the past it hasn't been an awfully large amount of money. I remember Mr. Bennett Sr., who I respected in many, many ways. He was a fighter in this House as well as a real gentleman. But that minister used to set up these small funds and use the interest for recreation and this, that and the other thing. Even then we were worried. You know, because of our respect for the Finance minister, we voted for them every time. It was only the Liberals that voted against it. You remember that, because you and I came in here at the same time, Mr. Minister of Transportation and Highways (Hon. Mr. Fraser). You don't like the truth, do you? But that's a fact. We did vote for those bills time after time, year after

[ Page 2304 ]

year. We voted for those bills because we felt that there was some kind of accountability. But we're talking about $168 million here and we're talking about $180-some-odd million in the other bill. What are we asked to do? Take all this money from accountability and say to those ministers: "Go spend it any way you like."

HON. MR. FRASER: Sit down and vote as you please.

MR. COCKE: We will vote as we please, Mr. Minister.

Mr. Speaker, isn't it incredibly funny that here we have $6.5 million allocated to the member in this House who used to be the most vocal of all the adversaries of this very kind of practice?

AN HON. MEMBER: The whale doctor.

MR. COCKE: The whale doctor, the Minister of Universities, Science and Communications, was an absolute ardent foe of any of this kind of budgeting, or any of this kind of financing.

AN HON. MEMBER: Where is he?

MR. COCKE: I'm sure that he's downstairs right now making phone calls, trying to figure out whether or not we can build another research plant out at UBC; which is fine, but can he come back? He's not even coming into the House to tell us what he's going to do with the money, let alone saying that he's going to report back.

The Minister of Finance has a very short fuse. Because of his short fuse, he has decided to take off, because, Mr. Speaker, I suggest to you that he knows better than anybody that this is not right. As the Minister of Finance he should be prepared to put every nickel into the estimates. Each portion of that money should be debated. It should be explained where it's going. Then, after the fact, it should be there for debate as to how you did.

How can we be asked to accept on good faith that the government is going to spend this money wisely? We've seen some crazy investments. We see the Minister of Universities' Science and Communications threatening to build a tunnel — to the tune of $3 billion to $4 billion — under the water between Vancouver Island and the mainland.

AN HON. MEMBER: Bye-bye Hugh Curtis.

MR. COCKE: Bye-bye Hugh, eh? And we see that same minister supporting a very large multimillion dollar complex in downtown Vancouver. But until we get some transit down there the only way you're going to be able to get to it is by helicopter.

I suspect that that kind of money, too, won't be put under the fiscal responsibility of the ministers in the estimates. That money, too, will come from this kind of practice, which has just got to stop.

I just don't know why we're getting into such bad habits. We thought, when this government came back with such a slim majority, that they would be chastened. We thought that maybe there would be a little more evidence of responsibility coming back with them. But instead of being chastened, they're as arrogant as ever.

MR. HALL: They're worse.

MR. COCKE: There coming back in here actually worse, as my colleague says. They're coming back in here, Mr. Speaker, and asking us to vote for even more preposterous suggestions than they've ever had before.

MR. HALL: Now they're arrogant and scared.

MR. COCKE: I guess that's right. I believe that they're arrogant and scared. Mr. Speaker, it's shocking, but far more shocking to the people of our province.

I ask the backbenchers just to think about it. Mr. Speaker, they're going to have to go back to their constituencies and report why they gave $300-odd million to ministers to expend with no assurance of accountability whatsoever. How are they going to answer that question when they get back up there to wherever they come from? I would be very worried if I were a backbencher for the government. I guess, if I were a minister, I would be reassured, because you know how people herd around one another and say everything's okay, and pat each other on the back and say everything will look fine in the morning. But, Mr. Speaker, I would be very worried if I were a backbencher in this government.

I'm suggesting to the backbenchers: vote against this bill. Vote for accountability in our province. Do it for your sake and do it for the province's sake. Those people out there that voted for you are trusting you. Now don't break faith with your electors.

MR. LORIMER: Here's another bill before us today, similar to Bill 7, another budgetary item placed in a bill — no accountability on the part of the government to explain the expenditures of these accounts, no answering to the Legislature as to what happened to the moneys taken from the people of British Columbia, another case of overtaxation of the people. There is a belief by that government over there that they are far more able to spend the funds in their hands than the public of this province in giving them a few dollars extra to spend on the needs of those people. Over and over again this year, we've seen this government's desire to create more money by taking more money from the public without need and without any planning whatever. They finished their budget address, set up their budget, and afterwards they found they'd got a lot of money left over. What are they going to do with it? They set up a variety of piggy banks in one bill, and in another bill they made another budgetary decision to give more money to certain ministries — a straight case of overtaxation, with no accountability whatever to the public or to this Legislature.

Here is the Minister of Transportation getting another $100 million. Now what's he going to do with that? He doesn't know, he has no plans for it, he has no idea whatever. They've got to give it somewhere. So we'll get a little more blacktop. "That's what we'll do with that money; we'll throw it away on blacktop" — no plan for it, nothing.

Interjection.

MR. LORIMER: That's correct, that's right on. He'll be able to spend this $100 million sometime, but at the moment he has no idea where he's going to spend it. He's been given an extra $100 million, which came from on high, and he'll have fun trying to figure out in the weeks to come what he's going to do with this extra $100 million.

[ Page 2305 ]

Then we have the Minister of Industry and Small Business Development (Hon. Mr. Phillips). Well, he's got another $5 million; that's to go with his other $60 million. But he has no idea what he's going to spend it on. You know, the way that ministry is operated, he doesn't need the $60 million to start with. What's he going to do with the extra $5 million?

MR. HALL: He just wants a set of clean towels.

MR. LORIMER: If the matter wasn't so serious, this would be a very humorous bill. There are just so many things in here.

You know, the previous Social Credit government had a minister of economic development and so on, who was very similar to the one we have now.

[Mr. Mussallem in the chair.]

Do you remember Waldo? Waldo was there, and he was very active in his portfolio. He accomplished about as much as the present minister did over the years. My colleague from Vancouver East at one time said — and I think this minister is just as good as he was — that Waldo was as useful as a bathtub deck. I think our present minister is that good. The extra $5 million, though, boggles the mind as to what's going to happen with it. He has no idea how he's going to spend the $60 million he has in the budget.

I'm disappointed that only one of our old Liberal ministers is here. They, of course, were very strongly opposed to this type of budgeting over the years. They made many impassioned speeches about it, and we all remember the way they used to hold forth for hours on the question of spending these kinds of funds without accountability. They were right then, but they've changed. They've seen the light, and they're now going along the line of their other government and are going ahead with hiding the funds in different ministries — no accountability, overtaxation, the last of the big time spenders.

Now we come to the grant of $3.5 million for universities. That seems to me to be an awfully large amount for the purchase of some Meccano sets, and that is about what that will be used for. Then on top of the $3.5 million there is another million in another grant; and not only that, there is another $2 million in a third grant to that minister, who used to spend hours and hours opposing those types of grants in this House. The Minister of Universities, Science and Communications (Hon. Mr. McGeer) will be given some more money — more than he has at the moment — to look into a variety of little projects. I don't know what he has at the moment to spend but he has a substantial budget, much more than he requires for the work that he seems to be producing to date. The addition of this extra amount that he will receive for the purposes of making further monuments for the memory of himself....

It goes on and on. I'm not going to speak at length on this bill. It's a very simple bill. It is a bill to cover up the failure of this government to properly create a budget, and they claim that there is money lying over, and they bring out a bill to spread it about.

The Minister of Transportation and Highways has no idea what he's going to use the $100 million for. It's just something to hide the fact that this government is so inept that three months ago they were unable to create a budget that would stand up, so they come up with a supplementary budget today in order to get rid of another $163 million and hide it from the public view.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The member for Prince Rupert.

HON. MR. GARDOM: Didn't you speak, Graham?

MR. LEA: No, you didn't pay attention. That was on the other bill.

The part that I would like to make some comments on is l(c): "An amount not exceeding $26.1 million to reduce the provincial unmatured debt of $235,347,790." If we remember back, we remember that this government purposely created this debt. It was away back in 1976 when they formed the government and they wanted to, at any cost, try and make the NDP look like they left a big deficit. So they passed a lot of money through orders-in-council and special warrants before the end of the fiscal year, building up the spending as quickly as they could, saying to departments, "Spend as much as you can," and going on and on trying to spend as much money and build as much deficit as they possibly could for political purposes. People say: "Well, maybe that's fair. All's fair in love, war and politics." Maybe it was all right that they did that little bit of a number on the people of British Columbia, pretending that there was a debt that didn't really exist.

Now we have all sorts of documentation to prove that that's exactly what they did. But the impression is left, so what they try to do is to have a lasting impression. As long as they can keep this debt that they created and that they're blaming the NDP for on the books, the longer they're hoping the people will think the NDP left the province in debt. But what is this really doing? What they're really doing as a political party and as a government is gypping every civil servant, municipal worker, school teacher and policeman — everybody who contributes to the pension funds that this government looks after. Because what they've done is they've borrowed money from the pension funds.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Does the hon. Minister of Transportation and Highways rise on a point of order?

HON. MR. FRASER: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker, the member for Prince Rupert said that we gyp people. I want him to withdraw that; that's not a fact.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Will the hon. member withdraw?

MR. LEA: Of course they didn't gyp them. It's just like stealing. It's just like stealing money out of people's pockets to keep a political debt on the books for your political gain, and that is what you are doing.

Interjections.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order, please. The Chair will not tolerate the word "stealing."

MR. LEA: What would you prefer?

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Something more honourable for this floor.

[ Page 2306 ]

MR. LEA: More honourable. Cheating. They are cheating the people who pay into pension plans in this province out of their deserved interest on the money they have invested. Because they are borrowing money from the pension plans for between 9 and 10 percent. That is the kind of earnings those pension plans are making because this government has decided to keep a phony debt on the books. Why don't they allow the pension funds to be invested at the normal rate that would accrue to those pension funds were they invested in the open market, somewhere around 14 percent? We know that we have about a 4 percent difference between the earnings of those pension funds and what they would actually be earning if this government wasn't playing cute with a debt that they created in the first place.

Everybody who is paying into a pension fund is, in my opinion, being cheated by this kind of procedure that the government is doing. I don't think anybody here would disagree with that, including government. How can they sit there with a billion dollars in the bank and a $235 million debt on which they are paying the poor pension holders about 9 1/2 percent?

[Mr. Davidson in the chair.]

Interjections.

MR. LEA: Oh, you're ashamed of the credit union, Mr. Minister, that you are part of this subterfuge. Because what it amounts to is taking money out of the pockets of pension holders without asking their permission. Why shouldn't the people who invested in their pensions have that money invested for the best possible return, at about 14 percent?

When we were in government we said we were going to go out to the open market to make some borrowings as opposed to borrowing all the money from the pension funds. Now the Minister of Finance, who at the time was a Conservative, agreed with us. Of course, now he is a Socred, he doesn't know what to think; he's part of it. The Minister of Finance, who sponsored this bill, knows that he disagreed with what this bill is doing when he was a Conservative sitting down here. The Attorney-General (Hon. Mr. Williams) disagreed with the principle of this bill when he sat down here as a Liberal; the Minister of Universities, Science and Communications (Hon. Mr. McGeer) disagreed with this bill when he was sitting down here; the Minister of Intergovernmental Relations (Hon. Mr. Gardom) disagreed with the principle of this bill when he was sitting down here. Now are all these people going to stand up and now say they agree with the principle, even the Minister of Finance, who strongly disagreed with this principle when he was a Conservative, but has now grasped it to his breast as a Socred — in fact, sponsored the bill? There has to be some morality here. What can you say, Mr. Speaker, about a group of people who are elected members, who said one thing sitting down here and said it was a principle that they believed in, but now say they're going to vote exactly opposite to the principle that they put forward only about five or six years ago?

HON. MR. MAIR: They've seen the light?

MR. LEA: Ah, the Minister of Health says: "Maybe they have seen the light. " Not at the end of that tunnel, I'll tell you that.

Mr. Speaker, as the member for Burnaby-Willingdon (Mr. Lorimer) said, if it weren't so serious, it would be a laugh. Here we have four members going to vote for this bill who absolutely do not believe in the principle of it: the Attorney-General.... I mean, you'd wonder how they can sit around at their clubs. What do they tell those people who supported them through thick and thin? That they're going to vote for this bill, when they said they don't agree with it; but now, in order to be part of the government, they're going to vote for something they don't believe in?

Mr. Speaker, it seems to me that with one billion dollars sitting in the bank, this debt could be paid off, paid back to the pension funds, and then that money could be invested on behalf of the pension funds in the open market and bring back a return of approximately 14 percent. On $235 million, that 4 percent difference between the investment that is in place and the investment that should be in place is a heck of a lot of money. Why should the pension funds be gypped by a government that is determined at any cost to try and make the people of this province believe that they didn't create the debt in the first place?

Let's go back to those days of 1976. Remember the big borrowing from ICBC? They came into the House and said: "ICBC is in debt for $181 million. The government is going to give them a grant."

MR. REE: Who created the debt?

MR. LEA: Oh, you weren't here, Mr. Member. Wait until you hear the story.

MR. REE: I was around.

MR. LEA: I know you were around; they saw you in the polls in 1975 in Burrard, you and the rest of them with your jackboots on.

AN HON. MEMBER: The goon squad.

MR. LEA: The goon squad — that's right. We knew you before you arrived here.

Mr. Speaker, in 1976, the government came into the House and said....

HON. MR. CURTIS: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker, we are all honourable members in this House, I think, and references such as "goon squad" and "jackboots" I find offensive. The member's debate is always quite direct, but that's a little....

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Thank you, hon. member. I would caution all members....

MR. LEA: I withdraw it. I do find it passing strange...

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Thank you, hon. member. The member withdraws.

MR. LEA: ...that they don't mind voting against their principles, but they don't like "goon squad" and "jackboot."

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Hon. member, order, please. The member has just withdrawn and then used the terms again. That is most irregular....

[ Page 2307 ]

MR. LEA: I withdraw it! I withdraw, but I do find it strange that the Minister of Finance — when I pointed it out to him — who spoke against the principle of this bill when he was a Conservative, and now sponsors it as a Socred, doesn't ask me to withdraw that. You know why, Mr. Speaker? Because it's true. That's something that the Minister of Finance is going to have to live with — a principle that meets the day. Wait until that tunnel comes right up in the centre of his little majority.

AN HON. MEMBER: Bye-bye Hugh.

MR. LEA: Who knows? Maybe he'll join another party before that happens. Life's a big party.

Mr. Speaker, I wanted to make the point that, in my opinion, the pensioners in this province are being gypped out of their rightful earnings by a government that is desirous of keeping a debt on the books for their own political purposes. I think everybody who contributes to the pension plan in this province should be told that that's what they're doing. They know they're doing it; we know they're doing it. Let's let the pension fund contributors know that that government's doing it.

MR. LAUK: I will be very brief, Mr. Speaker. I am not going to adjourn debate. I just have one minute of comments to make, and then I'll sit down, because I understand Mr. Speaker has some business to conclude before 5 o'clock.

It's come to my attention why, on this bill, the backbenchers of the Social Credit Party have not been speaking in this debate. They have not taken their place to speak out against or for this bill. Take the member for Omineca (Mr. Kempf), for example. There is a conspiracy of the back bench to remain silent in speaking out.

Here's a newspaper clipping from Omineca. It was sent by special post from a disgruntled constituent. It says: "Kempf Gives up on Legislature Debate." He says: "It's madness. Those who read Hansard will note the virtual absence of myself. This is not because I do not enjoy entering into sound, logical debate." He says: "Under the parliamentary system, the opposition spends all of its time trying to defeat the government."

SOME HON. MEMBERS: No!

MR. LAUK: Oh, yes!

He says: "Because Social Credit and NDP are so nearly equal in numbers, the government tends to hesitate, listening too long to minority opinion, and when it does finally react, it would appear to be knee-jerk rather than decisive action."

SOME HON. MEMBERS: No!

MR. LAUK: Now we know why the back bench is so quiet. I'm truly shocked that they will not speak on such an important bill, and I move adjournment of this debate until the next sitting of the House.

Motion approved.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Could hon. members allow the Chair a few minutes, as it might actually take us a few minutes longer than the agreed-to hour. Firstly, on Thursday last points of order were raised during question period following the giving of a lengthy answer by a minister. The purpose of the oral question period is expressed in the 9th report of the Select Standing Committee on Standing Orders and Private Bills, adopted on February 27, 1973. It read in part:

"...that the reference in standing order 25 to questions put by members be interpreted by Mr. Speaker as permitting a 15-minute oral question period for urgent and important questions without notice commencing at the opening of each day's session except Fridays. Your Committee further recommends that the following provisions be applied to the oral question period: (1) Only questions considered by the Speaker to be urgent and important shall be permitted and his decision shall be final. (2) No debate shall be permitted during questions; supplementary questions from members may be allowed by permission of Mr. Speaker. (3) Question period will be dispensed with on Fridays.

"All of which is respectfully submitted by G.V. Lauk, Chairman."

The purpose of the question period is not fulfilled when members ask questions which necessarily involve a lengthy, detailed answer, nor when ministers who have taken questions as notice give lengthy, detailed answers in the question period. Questions which necessarily involve a detailed answer too lengthy for question period should be placed on the order paper,

By way of recommendation the Chair has previously stated that when a minister has a lengthy answer to any question taken on notice, the minister concerned should advise the House at the conclusion of the oral question period that an answer has been tabled. I would also point out that the practice has developed of ministers seeking leave after the question period, to give an oral answer to questions taken on notice, as was apparent today.

On the second matter, on Thursday last the hon. member for Skeena (Mr. Howard) requested that the Speaker consider the application of standing order 1 in regard to the English practice of addressing questions on Thursday to the government House Leader as to the order of business for the following week. The government House Leader requested that consideration also be given of the usages and customs of the United Kingdom with respect to decorum, the order of speakers, estimates of speaking time and pairing.

Standing order 1 provides: "That in all cases not provided for hereafter, or by sessional or other orders, the usages and customs of the House of Commons of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, as enforced at the time, shall be followed as far as they may be applicable to this House." Standing order 25 sets out the general order of business for each day: "Within the general categories of business, the government House Leader has some discretion as to those items of government business which will be called."

I have checked the records of the House over the last ten years and note that there has not been a practice such as that suggested by the hon. member for Skeena, and accordingly find that the custom has not been adopted in this House. The matters raised, both by the hon. member and the House Leader, involve discretionary matters to be resolved by the respective leaders and Whips and are not matters upon which the Chair should comment, other than to say that if the parties are unable to agree, then they may wish to refer these matters

[ Page 2308 ]

to the Select Standing Committee on Standing Orders and Private Bills.

Thirdly, earlier today the Chair was challenged on a ruling and the Chair subsequently voted to uphold the ruling. I would like to refer members to the Journals of the House of Commons, December 4, 1963. I quote from page 622: "...and the result of the vote having been announced, Yeas 106, Nays 106, Mr. Speaker stated: 'Since the decision has not been negatived I declare my ruling sustained.'" I give that as information to all hon. members.

Hon. Mr. Gardom moved adjournment of the House.

Motion approved.

The House adjourned at 4:56 p.m.